INTRODUCTION xix 



made to show how more Beauty in Nature may be 

 discovered. 



Often in the Himalaya I have watched an eagle 

 circling overhead. I have sat on the mountain-side 

 and watched it sail majestically along in graceful 

 curves and circles, and with perfect ease and poise. 

 Far above the earth it would range, and seemingly 

 without exertion glide easily over tracts that we 

 poor men could only enter by prodigious effort. 

 Captivated by its grace of motion, and jealous of its 

 freedom, I would for hours watch it. And this eagle 

 I knew, from the height and distance from which it 

 would swoop down on its prey, to be possessed of 

 eyesight of unrivalled keenness in addition to its 

 capacity for movement. 



So this bird had opportunities such as no human 

 being — not even an airman — ^has of seeing the earth 

 and what is on it. At will it could glide over the 

 loftiest mountain ranges. At will it could sail above 

 the loveliest valleys. At will it could perch upon 

 any chosen point and observe things at close range. , 

 In a single day this one eagle might have seen the 

 finest natural scenery in the .world — the highest 

 mountain, the most varied forest, thickly populated 

 plains and bare, open plains, peoples, animals, birds, 

 insects, trees, flowers, all of the most varied descrip- 

 tion. In one day, and in the ordinary course of its 

 customary circlings and sailings, it might have seen 

 what men come from the ends of the Earth to view, 

 and are content if they see only a hundredth part of 

 what the eagle sees every day. 



From its mountain eerie in Upper Sikkim it 



