298 
WILD SCENES AND SONG-BIRDS. 
pression of doubt, wlietlier it may not still prove to be tbe 
young of tlie Bald Eagle, {Fako Leucocephalus,) and wbich 
strong doubt of his lias since been proven beyond question, 
to have suggested the truth. Wilson says : 
^' We were disposed after the manner of some, to sub- 
stitute, for plain matters of fact, all the narratives, conjec- 
tures and fanciful theories of travellers, voyagers, compilers, 
etc., relative to the history of the eagle ; the volumes of these 
writers, from Aristotle down to his admirer, the Count de 
Buffon, would furnish abundant materials for this purpose. 
But the author of the present work feels no ambition to ex- 
cite surprise and astonishment at the expense of truth, or to 
attempt to elevate and embellish his subject beyond the plain 
realities of nature. On this account he cannot assent to the 
assertion, however eloquently made in the celebrated parallel 
drawn by the French Naturalist between the lion and the 
eagle, viz. : that the eagle, like the lion, ^ disdains the pos- 
session of that property Avhich is not the fruit of his own 
industry, and rejects, with contempt, the prey which is not 
procured by his own exertions since the very reverse of 
this is the case, in the conduct of the Bald and Sea-Eagle, 
who, during the summer months, are the constant robbers 
and plunderers of the Osprey or Fish-Hawk, by whose indus- 
try alone both are fed. Nor that, ' though famished for loant 
of prey ^ he disdains to feed on carrion f since we have our- 
selves seen the Bald Eagle, while seated on the dead carcass 
of a horse, keep a whole flock of vultures at a respectful 
distance, until he has fully sated his own appetite The 
Count has also taken great pains to expose the ridiculous 
opinion of Pliny, who conceived that the Ospreys formed 
no separate race, and that they proceeded from the inter- 
mixture of different species of eagles, the young of Avhich 
were not Ospreys, only sea eagles: ^ luhich sea eagles,^ says 
he, '■breed small vultures^ which engender great vultures^ thai 
have not the power of propagation^ But, while laboring to 
confute these absurdities, the Count himself in his belief on 
