“THE LAST AMERICAN” 293 
like a gigantic inverted thimble, in the tree top— 
the noise of two small and very hungry eaglets 
anticipating dead fish. Both parents sank to the 
rim of the nest, where they stood outlined sharply 
against the sweet May sky, and the fish was ap- 
portioned between the infants, which were then 
two yawning gullets opening into a small collec- 
tion of white, downy feathers. There is a time 
at the beginning of its career when even the hu- 
man infant is not a pretty thing, save to its in- 
fatuated parents, resembling rather a wizened 
Chinaman or a four alarm fire than something 
fashioned in the image of its Maker. A baby 
bird, especially when about to be fed, is even less 
pleasing to look upon. Yet Baldy and his mate 
were tremendously pleased with what they had 
produced. And why wouldn’t they be? This 
nest was built on the ruins of one they had made 
the year before, and in which the mother had laid 
two sets of eggs. The first set had been laid on 
the first day of March, and the chicks broke 
through the first of April, only to be taken al- 
most immediately by some man or boy while both 
parents were away fishing. ‘Two more eggs were 
