ORDER ACCIPITRES. 229 



season. The flight of this eagle is so high, that it is oft«i com* 

 plrtely lost sight of. From this great distance, hofwever, its 

 crv is still andible. and then resembles the barking of a smaQ 

 dog. This eagle boilds. on the most rasped rocks, a flat oest 

 about five feet square, where ii rears the young, whose opesa- 

 tions it also directs during their adolescence. Its eggs are of a 

 brown red; with blackish stripes. It is particularly £ood of 

 hares, which form its principal food. It also preys oo Tarioos 

 birds, and even on lambs. The male eagle never hunts atone, 

 except when the female cannot quit the eggs or young. At 

 other seasons they always hunt together : and some moon- 

 taineers pretend that one beats the bushes, while the other 

 remains in some elevated place to stop the prey on its passage. 

 According to Marco Polo, the eagle is employed in Tartary to 

 hont hares, and even wolves and foxes, but this probaWy a{^[Jies 

 to the great eagle : the common eagle was of no u^ in &I- 

 conry. Spallanzani has observed, in ration to this bird, that 

 when it swaUows pieces of meat, two streams of fluid spring 

 from the apertures of its nostrils, run down the upper part of the 

 beak, and xmiting at its point, enter it and mix with the food. 



The Martial Eagle, sometimes called the yr^ard, is a large 

 species discovered in Africa by Le Vaillant. It inhabits the 

 country of the great Xamaquois, berween the twenty-eighth 

 degree of south latitude and the tropic, and probably exists in 

 other parts of Africa. When perched, it emits diarp and 

 piercing cries, mixed with hoarse and lugubrious tone, which 

 are heard at a great distance. It flies, with the legs pendant, 

 and. like the common eagle, rises so high tiat it is lost sight of, 

 though its cry is still audible. Highly courageous, it never 

 sufiers any great bird of rapine to approach within its domain. 

 It hunts gazelles and hares. 



The griflferds, like the other eagles, are usually observed in 

 <»uples, but during the hatching time the male akne provides 

 for the subsistence of the familv. The nest is formed berween 

 precipitous rocks, or on the summits of \oity trees. Its basts is 



