YOUNG BIRDS IN THE NURSERY 67 



which he had always greeted his parents' return. It was 

 a little harsher, though a trifle louder, than the cry with 

 which, as a babe in white down, he had hailed their 

 coming, and the small voice proceeding from so large a 

 bird seemed now somewhat incongruous. Then suddenly a 

 dark form rushed up the corrie, and his mother swung past 

 on silent wings. She circled round and round, as though 

 annoyed at finding him still in the nest, then settled on 

 the rocks beyond and tried to tempt him from his fastness. 

 But the eaglet was unwilling to obey, for his hunger had 

 been appeased, and still the rain pattered down pitilessly 

 outside the eyrie. She rose once more into the air and 

 flew towards him, almost buffeting him with her wings 

 as she swooped past the nest. Again and again she 

 hovered round, and then a wild weird cry ran echoing 

 round down the glen. For the first time I had heard the 

 yelp of the adult eagle, the voice of the Queen of Birds 

 caUing to her young. Thrice was the note repeated, then 

 again silence reigned for awhile. The eaglet cheeped 

 continuously till, as though seized by some irresistible 

 impulse, he flapped to the very edge of the abyss and 

 turned his head from side to side listening to her call. 

 And now he, too, changed his cry, his voice seemed to 

 break, and the adult yelp, though in a lower and feebler 

 key, burst frorii his throat. The eagles called to each 

 other, yelp answered yelp as they held strange converse 

 in this wild mountain solitude. The young eagle gazed 

 around him as though taking a last farewell of his birth- 

 place, spread out his giant wings, and vanished for ever 

 from my sight among the ledges below." 



The Swallow tribe afford us another instance where 

 the capture of food demands great agility on the wing, 

 and this is to be acquired only by practice and precept. 



