168 OUR FRIENDS, THE BIRDS. 
should be taken away, I should feel as though one of 
the family had gone.” 
“The Eagle is familiar to all of us in one way or 
another,” said Miss Sweet, “as it is well known in 
picture and story, but in its wild state it comes and 
goes like a visitor. 
“Benjamin Franklin said of the Eagle: ‘For my 
part I wish the Bald Eagle had not been chosen as the 
representation of our country. He is a bird of bad 
moral character; he does not get his living honestly. 
You may have seen him perched upon some dead tree, 
where, too lazy to fish for himself, he watches the labors 
of the Fishing-hawk, and when the diligent bird has at 
length taken a fish and is bearing it away to his nest 
for the support of his mate and young ones, the Bald 
Eagle pursues him and takes it from him. * * #* 
He is, therefore, by no means a proper emblem for the 
brave and honest Cincinnati of America, who has driven 
out all the Kingbirds of our country.’ 
“Yet the Eagle has had his admirers among the 
poets who, no doubt, overlook his deficiencies of charac- 
ter in their admiration of his grand size and wonderful 
powers of flight and dignified appearance.” 
THE EAGLE. 
BY JAMES G. PERCIVAL. 
Thou art perched aloft on the beetling crag, 
And the waves are white below, 
And on, with a haste that cannot lag 
They rush in an endless flow. 
