EAGLES AND EAGLE-LIKE BIRDS. 149 



bird whether on the perch or wing, bub when seen 

 circling up in lofty flight, renewing the impulse from 

 time to time by a few strokes of its wings, the 

 absence of effort bespeaks the presence of confident 

 power, as becomes this monarch of the air. 



WHITE-TAILED EAGLE— 3 feet ; tail pure white ; legs 

 unfeathered. 



WHITE -TAILED EAGLE. — Plate 67. 3 feet. 

 General colour of upper parts brown, inclining to 

 gray on the head and neck, and some of the wing- 

 feathers having lighter edges ; flight-feathers black ; 

 tail white ; under parts brown, ligljter on the throat 

 and chest ; bill and feet yellow, the legs not feathered. 

 Young birds : head blackish-brown ; upper and under 

 parts highly mottled, light brown on lower back ; tail 

 brown ; bill dark ; feet yellow. Principally winter 

 migrant. 



Eggs.— 2, dirty- white; 2-85 ^ 2-2 inches (plate 127). 



Nest. — A mass of sticks, with softer material for 

 lining, placed on sea-cliffs, but sometimes on an 

 inland rock or water-surrounded island. 



Distribution.— Only in some of the islands north 

 and west of Scotland, and at rare points on the west 

 coast of Ireland. 



All but extirpated from the British Isles as a 

 breeding species, the White-Tailed Eagle — generally 

 young birds migrating — appears yearly in the coast 

 counties during the autumn and winter months. It 

 nests for the most part on sea-cliffs, preying largely 

 upon cliff-breeding species, but varying its diet by 



