BIRDS 193 



near the eastern extremity of the vale of Newlands, not far from 

 Keswick, and the other at Crummock Water. . . . When visit- 

 ing all the lakes of Cumberland, Westmorland, and Lancashire, 

 except Loweswater, Ennerdale, and Wastwater, in the month of 

 July 1835, I saw Eagles on the one day only.' 1 In January 

 1890 I made the acquaintance of an aged native of Keswick, 

 Mr. Hodgson, then in his 96th year. This old gentleman 

 assured me that, even when he was grown up, a pair of Eagles 

 frequented Helvellyn, and he had often seen them, the only 

 Eagles he ever saw flying wild, though he had seen caged 

 Eagles, brought no doubt from Scotland. I mentioned the 

 matter to the Eev. H. D. Eawnsley, who afterwards called on 

 him and found that he remembered that a couple of Eagles were 

 flying about Helvellyn for about three months, and the year, as 

 nearly as Mr. Eawnsley could make it out, was 1836. This 

 would explain the Eagles which Thompson saw, because there is 

 not much difference between 1836 and 1835. 



In a draught of July 11, 1843, T. C. Heysham inquired of 

 Mr. John Dodgson of Eoantrees what he knew about Eagles, 

 remarking that a friend, who had passed Christenbury Craigs 

 in Bewcastle en route for Scotland, had been told that a pair of 

 Eagles bred there in or about the year 1824; that they reared 

 their young, and that one of the old birds was captured. He 

 was informed likewise that the old birds had committed some 

 havoc among the lambs. Dodgson replied, that at the time 

 indicated, in the month of either February or March, an Eagle 

 had made its appearance in the district, and continued to haunt 

 Christenbury Craigs and other mountains in the vicinity for 

 several weeks, when it departed, having successfully eluded all 

 attempts at its destruction. 'There was not a pair, and of 

 course there was no nest or young.' Between 1833 and 1835, 

 another Eagle visited the mountains near Christenbury Craigs, 

 and was shot a few miles north of the Craigs by the keeper of 

 the Duke of Northumberland, for whom it was preserved. The 

 bird was * one of the large eagles common in Sutherland and 

 other northern counties in Scotland.' It was of ' a brownish 

 colour.' 



1 Natural History of Ireland, vol. i. p. 29. 



N 



