AVES—EAGLE. 447 
gum arabic, and presenting less of the downy gloss exhibited on the vpper part 
of the bald-headed eagle’s plumage. The male bird weighs fourteen anda 
nalt pounds avoirdupois, measures three feet seven inches in length, and 
ten feet two inches in extent. 
“From the above account it will be seen that the bird here described, and 
faithfully figured from a fresh killed specimen, is a very scarce species, even . 
in those parts where it is a native; and that it is rarely met with, the few 
opportunities I have had of seeing it, the dates of which I have generally 
given, are a sufficient proof.” 
WHITE-HEADED, OR BALD EAGLE. 
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Tuas distinguished bird has been long known to naturalists, being common 
to both continents, and occasionally met with from a very high northern 
latitude, to the borders of the torrid zone, but chiefly in the vicinity of the 
sea, and along the shores and cliffs of our lakes, and large rivers. Formed 
by nature for braving the severest cold; feeding equally vpon the produce 
of the sea and of the land; possessing powers of flight capable of outstripping 
even the tempests themselves; unawed by any thing but man; and from 
the ethereal heights to which he soars, looking abroad, at one glance, on an 
immeasurable expanse of forests, fields, lakes, and ocean deep below him, 
he appears indifferent to the little localities of change of seasons; as ina 
few minutes he can pass from summer to winter, from the lower to the 
higher regions of the atmosphere, the abode of eternal cold; and thence 

— 

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1 Falco leucocephatus, Lin. 
