2 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



to the White-tailed Eagle. Nor is Mr. Macpherson's objection 

 fatal, that there are no precipices in Whinfield Park, for, like the 

 Osprey, the White-tailed Eagle is well known to build occasionally 

 on trees : and, if head-money was, at the time, offered for the 

 destruction of Eagles, so much the more need would there be for 

 preservation on the part of the Countess of Pembroke, especially 

 if the nest was placed in a situation so exposed as a tall tree. 



Dr. Heysham, in his Catalogue of Cumberland Animals 

 prefixed to the 'History and Antiquities of Cumberland' (1794), 

 includes only two Eagles, these being (2), the "Cinereous or 

 White-tailed Eagle," breeding among the rocks near Keswick 

 every year; and (1), the " Sea-Eagle, Falco ossifragus" of which 

 there used, a few years previously, to be an annual nest at 

 Ullswater, from which a trout upwards of ten pounds weight 

 was taken. Here again the Sea-Eagle, is clearly H. albicilla, 

 and further there can be little doubt that this nest belonged 

 to the White-tailed Eagle, because in Latham's ' Synopsis,' — 

 Supplement, p. 11 (1787), — under " Cinereous Eagle," the same 

 or a similar story is told, on the authority of Dr. Heysham, 

 relating to an Eagle whose tail became white after six or seven 

 years in captivit} r . Latham's exact words are : — " In a nest of 

 one of these birds, near Keswick, in Cumberland, was found 

 a Gray or Hulsewater trout, of above twelve pounds weight. 

 Dr. Heysham, who informed me of this, added to the observation 

 that he obtained the bird alive, and had kept it above ten years 

 at the time of his communicating to me the account ; and that it 

 was either six or seven years before the tail became white." 



Now, if this story refers to Ullswater, it is sufficient proof 

 that this nest belonged to the White-tailed Eagle. If, on the 

 other hand, Heysham was speaking of the White-tailed Eagles 

 which had their nest near Keswick, we may well suppose that 

 these birds were accustomed to seek their prey, the great lake 

 trout, at Ullswater, and may thus have been frequently seen 

 fishing by Richardson. 



The Rev. W. Richardson, writing in 1793 (Hist, of Cumber- 

 land, p. 449), gives only two Eagles as found about Ullswater: — 

 (1). " Falco chrysaetos, Golden Eagle," of which he tells us that 

 a pair had an aery in Martindale in 1778 and 1779. (2). "Falco 

 Haliaetus, Osprey or Fishing Eagle," which was "frequently 



ii fishing 



