WASHINGTON" EAGLE AND FISH-HAWK. 
803 
dark slamberous home, and on strong vans goes beating np 
towards the clouds ; ah, that too, was a sight ! 
But then to see deep down, that couchant tj^rant deep 
down below, "levelling his neck for flight" (as the " glorious 
Weaver" has it) ! — ^his war-crest raised, his wings half spread, 
pausing for the moment on his stoop, and then, one clamor- 
ous shriek of confident savage power, and see him vault — 
away, up, up, with a swift cleave, conquering gravitation, 
and go lifted on the spell of wings ! Wonderful sight — that 
upward struggle ! The Fish-Hawk has taken warning from 
the exulting cry of his old enemy, and with yet louder cries, 
as if for help, goes up and upward, swifter, still with vain 
beatings that scatter the fleece-forms of cloud, above me and 
stir them whirling in gyrations. But no, the conqueror, 
with overcoming wings, is upon him, with fierce buffetings, 
the stirred chaos cannot hide from me, and the Fisher drops 
its prey with a despairing shriek, while it goes gleaming head- 
long toward its ravished home 1 
Now but an instant's poise while the sunlight can flash off 
a ray from steadied plumes, and the eagle goes, dimmed with 
swiftness, roaring down to catch the falling prey, before it 
reach the wave ! Monarch humanity ! — with poet's spirit- 
wing hast thou in all thy hoary annals an image such as 
this of swift all-conquering prowess ! Napoleon is the near- 
est type of the Bald Eagle the world ever saw ! — excepting 
the Yankee ! ! 
But the Fish -Hawk, although the mildest, the most gen- 
erous and social of all the Falconidce^ still recognizes that 
point beyond which forbearance is a virtue. When the 
plundering outrages of the Bald Eagle have been at length 
carried to an intolerable extreme, in any particular locality, 
the Fish-Hawks in the neighborhood combine in a common 
assault upon the tyrannical robber. I have frequently wit- 
nessed such scenes along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. 
They abound in great numbers along the estuaries of its 
great rivers. I remember particularly to have noted the 
