148 



ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. 



brown, with an intermixture of lighter brown on the 

 edges of the feathers, and particularly on the shoulders. 

 The feathers appear to be for the most part white at 

 the base, or accompanied by a fine white down, so that 

 when they are raffled the brown colour of the surface 

 appears to be mixed or mottled with white. The quill- 

 feathers of the wings are rather darker than the rest of 

 the plumage ; and the insides of the legs and the tarsal 

 feathers are of a lighter brown. The entire tail is of 

 a uniform brownish black, varied only by occasional 

 transverse narrow wavy bars of gray, which appear to 

 become more and more obsolete as the bird advances in 

 age. It would also appear that the whole plumage 

 gradually assumes, in the older individuals, a lighter 

 shade of brown. The cere and toes are of a dull yel- 

 low; the beak bluish horn-colour, darker towards the 

 tip; the irides hazel; and the claws deep black. 



When full grown the Golden Eagle measures about 

 three feet in length, and upwards of seven in the 

 expanse of its wings. The latter when closed very 

 nearly reach the extremity of the tail, which is strik- 

 ingly rounded in its outline by the regular abbreviation 

 of the feathers on either side. The beak is less, deeply 

 divided than in the Imperial Eagle, the separation of 

 the mandibles not extending farther backwards, accord- 

 ing to M. Temminck, than the anterior angle, or rather, 

 according to our own observations, than the middle, of 

 the eye. The beak is large, powerful, and deeply 

 curved ; the eyes are remarkably bright and piercing ; 

 and the toes are furnished beneath with several large 

 callous tubercles, increasing in size towards the extre- 

 mity, so as to protect the talons, which are extremely 

 acute and much elongated. Of these the inner and 

 posterior are by far the longest, and the latter some- 



