62 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



is a bird cry which sounds like a human one — quite startling, 

 so that I hastily draw up the window of the tent, but can 

 see nothing. A little while afterwards I come out of the tent, 

 and, as I sit close to it, by the side of the rock, an Eagle 

 " swims into my ken," and, coming rapidly up, the sitting bird, 

 whilst he is still some way from the nest, but within its aerial 

 region, so to speak, flies out, to join him, with the little unim- 

 pressive squeak, for it hardly deserves a better epithet. They 

 sweep about, for a little, then one of them descends on the eyrie, 

 but almost immediately flies off it, again, to circle with its mate, as 

 before. After a little time, there is a second descent on the nest, 

 and the bird seems to settle down on it, but in a minute or two 

 leaves it, as before, and again joins the other, as Eagles under- 

 stand the expression. And now, for some time, they sweep, 

 sail, and circle, on wings spread and motionless, smoothly and 

 largely, like planetary bodies in space, sometimes disappearing 

 beyond the horizon of the cliff-line, then, after a little, floating 

 up again, passing and sweeping away from one another, return- 

 ing " from the ends of opposed winds " and re-meeting " as over 

 a vast," never really together, often widely asunder, yet still in 

 a spacious companionship ; for the speed at which they move, in 

 their effortless flight, as, no doubt, their great range of vision, 

 extends the limits of neighbourhood, for these birds, far beyond 

 our own poor conception of it — great fields of air are as a cosy 

 corner to them. Much finer cries now drop from the air, but 

 these are so Gull-like in their intonation that as the Eagles 

 have now passed beyond the hemmed-in limits of where I can 

 see to, I cannot feel sure that it is they who are uttering them. 

 No Gulls, however, come into sight, and the cries seem stronger 

 and wilder than anything I have heard Gulls utter. They are 

 wild and impressive, and their strength seems proportionate to 

 the size of these great, lordly birds. All this, however, may be 

 — probably is — due to imagination. 



It is about 4.45 a.m., when one of the Eagles comes down, 

 with a fine, rushing swoop, on the eyrie, where it stands in full 

 view, for some seconds, before sinking down into the cavity of 

 the nest, which unfortunately, with the exception of the head, 

 hides it completely — for I am looking up at, not down into it. 

 1 cannot even see the nest itself, but only the spot where it is, 



