WHITE-BELLIED SEA-EAGLE. 
visited “Louth Island, lying about five miles off the coast. On arriving 
there he observed a pair of Halicetus leucogaster circling overhead, but out 
of range : the island was covered with a short undergrowth, and in parts the 
abode of countless numbers of Little Penguins {Eudyptula minor). Later on 
he discovered the nest built on a cliff, about one hundred feet above, and 
overhanging the water, containing two half-fledged young. The nest was an 
immense structure, built of boughs and thin sticks lined with finer material, 
twelve feet in diameter, the top of it two feet in height from the ground and 
had evidently been resorted to for a number of years. In and around it were 
over two hundred more or less perfect skins of Little Penguins, which had 
been entirely divested of every particle of flesh by the Sea-Eagles leaving 
the skins almost entire.” Mr. E. D. Atkinson wrote : “ Some years ago, 
when living in D’Entrecasteaux Channel, Tasmania, I cut down a tree of 
medium size on Bruni Island which contained a nest of this species; there 
were two young birds, one of which was killed by the falling tree, the other 
I took home and kept for some considerable time. Although it had full 
liberty it never offered to go far away, but would fly about my house from 
tree to tree. When I held out a fish it would swoop down and take it from 
my hand, and then return to its high perch. Unfortunately, and much to 
my regret, this bird was shot.” 
Legge, as long ago as 1887, writing of the Birds of Maria Island, 
Tasmania, took occasion to make the following comments {Papers and Proc. 
Roy. Soc. Tasm. 1887, p. 84, 1888) : “ Found sparingly round the coast 
(B(ernacchi)). My son saw one at the settlement. This widely-spread Sea- 
Eagle is not so common about the indented coast of the south of Tasmania 
as I shordd have expected. During the last three years only three examples 
have been seen by me in the Derwent. It builds occasionally on the Actseon 
Islands, on one of which Mr. Joseph Graves found a nest in November, three 
years ago. It was made on the ground among the rank vegetation and low 
scrub. Gould draws attention to its habit of building on the ground ip. the 
islands of Bass Straits, where the structure is formed of the ‘ twigs and 
branches of the Barilla bush.’ In Ceylon, where it is far more abundant 
than in these latitudes, and where every inland tank of any size has one or 
two pairs frequenting it, this eagle always builds on a lofty tree. Gould 
speaks of the Sea-Eagle being very common in D’Entrecasteaux Channel. I 
know of one pair building there, but I fancy its numbers have decreased 
before the efforts of the wild-fowler.” 
From a criticism of the evidence it would seem that the “ wild-fowler ” 
does not deserve much blame in the matter of the extermination of this 
Eagle, as poison is more correctly blamed by Maclaine, though of course 
141 
