GOLDEN EAGLE. 
207 
The descriptions given of the Golden Eagle by systematic writers, 
appear to correspond but little with the name. Willughby says that 
“ the small feathers of the whole body are a dark ferruginous or 
chestnut colour.” Linnseus, that “ the body is variegated with brown 
or rusty.” Latham, that “ the head and neck are deep brown, the 
feathers bordered with tawny, the hind part bright rust colour, body 
dark brown.” Bewick, that “ the general colour is deep brown, mixed 
with tawny on the head and neck.” Fleming, that “ the accuminated 
feathers on the head and neck are bright rust colour, the rest of the 
plumage dusky brown.” Selby, that “ the secondary quills are clouded 
with hair-brown, broccoli-brown, and umber-brown ; crown of the head 
and nape of the neck pale orange-brown, chin and throat dark umber- 
brown ; vent pale reddish brown.” Baron Cuvier, that it is more or 
less brown.” Temminck, that the young at the age of one or two 
years have all the plumage of ferruginous or reddish brown, clear and 
uniform on all parts of the body, and in proportion as they advance in 
age the colours of the plumage become more embrowned (rembru- 
nissent ) ;” while Bulfon alone says, “ the plumage at first is white, 
then faint yellow, and afterwards it becomes a bright copper colour.” 
Belon even ventures to infer that when Aristotle first used the term golden, 
(xpwvaeTk), he did not mean that it was gilded, but only rather more 
reddish than other species.^ But on turning to the passage in Aris- 
totle, we find that he says expressly that the “ colour is yellow” 
(xpwyua ^av66s.)~ 
I can only reconcile these conflicting opinions by inferring, that as 
the Golden Eagle is not by any means so often seen as the common 
eagle, (^Jlaliaetus alhicilla, SAViGNV,)the latter has been confounded with 
the former. During the summer of 1829, I saw an eagle kept in the 
garden of Mr. Perkins, at Lee, in Kent, whose plumage fully merited 
Aristotle’s epithet of golden, for though it had little metallic lustre, it 
had that peculiar shade of russet yellow which gold exhibits when alloyed 
with copper, the feathers appearing, indeed, as if they had been powdered 
with gold dust. Previous to this, I had seen both in menageries and 
museums many birds called Golden Eagles, but without the slightest 
claim to the title, which now first struck me as highly appropriate. In 
the following August, I saw another bird of this species, at large, a league 
or so above Bonn on the Rhine. It was beating about among the or- 
chards, and on the look-out, no doubt, for a hare or a rabbit, to carry 
to its eyry, which was probably situated on “ the castled crag of 
Drachenfels,” immediately opposite, or some other precipice on the 
‘ Belon, Oyseaux, p. 91. 
^ Aristotle, Hist. Anim. lx. c. 32, 
