THE GOLDEN EAGLE. 175 



he knew it by intuition or from practical observation, 

 is correct in his expression, 



'■ The famished eagle screams, and passes by." 



Great as are the distances which these birds some- 

 times fly, it becomes comprehensible when we know 

 that an eagle, as he sweeps freely through the air, tra- 

 verses a space of sixty feet in a second of time. To be 

 able thus rapidly to move along is undoubtedly an 

 attribute of power; but there is something far more 

 imposing, far more majestic in that calm, onward 

 motion when, with wings outspread and quite still, the 

 mighty bird floats buoyantly in the atmosphere, upheld 

 and borne along by the mere act of volition. The 

 length of time he can thus remain suspended without a 

 single beat of his broad, shadowy pinions is, to me, still 

 an inexplicable fact. He will sail forward in a perfectly 

 horizontal direction for a distance of more than a mile, 

 without the slightest quiver of a feather giving sign 

 that the wings are moved. 



Not less extraordinary is the power the bird possesses 

 of arresting himself instantaneously at a certain spot in 

 dropping through the air with folded wings from a height 

 of three or four thousand feet. When circling so high 

 up that he shows but as a dot, he will suddenly close 

 both wings, and, falling like an aerolite, pass through 

 the intervening space in a few seconds of time. With 



