354 Unexplored Spain 
rock-stack, that stood forth in a terribly steep scree. From a 
cavern in the face of this (prettily overhung by a clump of red- 
berried mistletoe) flew the male eagle. From below, the eyrie 
was accessible to within a dozen feet; but that interval proved 
impassable. In the evening we returned, with the rope, and 
having made this fast above, L. was about to ascend from below, 
when the man left in charge at the top (probably misunderstand- 
ing his instructions) let all go, and down came the rope clattering 
at our feet! It was too late to rectify the blunder that night, 
and a month elapsed ere we would revisit the spot. Then this 
curious result ensued. The eagles, we found, had so bitterly 
GOLDEN EAGLE HUNTING 
(1) The “stoop ”—quite vertical. (2) ‘*Got him.” 
resented the indignity of a rope having been (even momentarily) 
stretched athwart their portals that they had abandoned their 
stronghold, leaving two handsome eggs, partly incubated. Their 
eyrie was eight feet deep, its entrance partly overgrown with ivy 
and (as above mentioned) overhung by red-berried mistletoe 
growing on a wild-cherry—the nest built of sticks, lined with 
esparto, and adorned with green ivy-leaves and twigs of pinsdpo. 
The golden eagle is still common, ornamenting with majestic 
flight every sierra in Spain. For eagles are notoriously difficult 
to kill, and, when killed, cannot be eaten; so the goat-herd, 
with characteristic apathy and Arab fatalism, suffers the ravages 
on his kids and contents himself with an oath. Only once have 
we found a nest in a tree; it was a giant oak, impending a 
