106 TRIUMPH OF THE WING. 
On looking at him closely, you perceive that he has no feet. Or at 
all events, feet which being palmate and exceedingly short, can neither 
walk nor perch. With a formidable beak, he has not the talons of a 
true eagle of the sea. A pseudo-eagle, and superior to the true in 
his daring as in his powers of flight, he has not, however, his 
strength, his invincible grasp. He strikes and slays: can he seize? 
Thence arises his life of uncertainty and hazard—the life of a 
corsair and a pirate rather than of a mariner—and the fixed inquiry 
ever legible on his countenance: “Shall I feed? Shall I have 
wherewithal to nourish my little ones this evening?” 
The immense and superb apparatus of his wings becomes on land 
