94 WHITE-HEADED, OR BALD EAGLE. 



vulture, the raven, and the bald eagle, the subject of the 

 present account. This bird has been long known to natu- 

 ralists, being common to both continents, and occasionally 

 met with from a very high northern latitude, to the borders 

 of the torrid zone, but chiefly in the vicinity of the sea, and 

 along the shores and cliffs of our lakes and large rivers. 

 Formed by nature for braving the severest cold ; feeding 

 equally on the produce of the sea and of the land ; possessing 



two young ones, which crawled to the extremity of the hole to receive a 

 fine fish. I had a perfect view of this noble bird, as he held himself to 

 the edging rock, hanging like the barn, bank, or social swallow, his tail 

 spread, and his wings partly so. I trembled lest a word should escape 

 my companions. The slightest murmur had been treason from them. 

 They entered into my feelings, and, though little interested, joined with 

 me. In a few minutes the other parent joined her mate. She glanced 

 her quick and piercing eye around, and instantly perceived that her 

 abode had been discovered. She dropped her prey, with a loud shriek, 

 communicated the alarm to the male, and, hovering with him over our 

 heads, kept up a growling cry." It was not till two years after that Mr 

 Audubon had the good fortune to shoot this eagle ; and the following 

 description was then taken : — 



" Bill, bluish black, the edges pale; the soft margin towards the com- 

 missure, and the base of the under mandible, yellow ; cere, yellowish 

 brown ; lore, light greenish blue ; iris, chestnut brown ; feet, deep yel- 

 low ; claws, bluish black ; upper part of the head, hind neck, back 

 scapulars, rump, tail-coverts, and posterior tibial feathers, blackish 

 brown, glossed with a coppery tint ; throat, foreneck, breast, and belly, 

 light brownish yellow, each feather marked along the centre with black- 

 ish brown ; wing-coverts, light grayish brown, those next the body 

 becoming darker, and approaching the colour of the back; primary 

 quills, dark brown, deeper on their inner webs ; secondaries, lighter', 

 and on their outer webs, of nearly the same light tint as their coverts ; 

 tail, uniform dark brown ; anterior tibial feathers, grayish brown. 



"Length, three feet seven inches ; extent of wings, ten feet two inches; 

 bill, three and a quarter inches along the back ; along the gap, which 

 commences directly under the eye, to the tip of the lower mandible, 

 three and one-third, and one and three quarters deep ; length of wing 

 when folded, thirty-two inches ; length of tail, fifteen inches ; tarsHS, four 

 and a half ; middle, four and three-quarters ; hind claw, two and a half. 



"The two stomachs, large and baggy; their contents in the individual 

 described were fish, fishes' scales, and entrails of various kinds ; intes- 

 tines, large, but thin and transparent." — Ed. 



