74 
FISH-HAWK, OR OSPREY. 
higher regions of the air, where he glides about in all the ease 
and majesty of his species. At once from this sublime aerial 
height he descends like a perpendicular torrent, plunging into 
the sea with a loud rushing sound, and with the certainty of a 
rifle. In a few moments he emerges, bearing in his claws his 
struggling prey, which he always carries head foremost; and 
having risen a few feet above the surface, shakes himself as a 
water spaniel would do, and directs his heavy and laborious 
course directly for the land. If the wind blow hard, and his 
nest lie in the quarter from whence it comes, it is amusing to 
observe with what judgment and exertion he beats to windward, 
not in a direct line, that is, in the wind’s eye, but making several 
successive tacks to gain his purpose. This will appear the more 
striking, when we consider the size of the fish which he some- 
times bears along. A shad was taken from a Fish-Hawk, near 
Great Egg-harbour, on which he had begun to regale himself, 
and had already ate a considerable portion of it, the remainder 
weighed six pounds. Another Fish-Hawk was passing Mr. 
Beasley’s, at the same place, with a large flounder in his grasp, 
which struggled and shook him so, that he dropt it on the shore. 
The flounder was picked up, and served the whole family for 
dinner. It is singular that the Hawk never descends to pick up 
a fish which he happens to drop, either on the land or on the 
water. There is a kind of abstemious dignity in this habit of 
the Hawk, suplerior to the gluttonous voracity displayed by 
most other birds of prey, particularly by the Bald Eagle, whose 
piratical robberies committed on the present species have been 
already fully detailed in treating of his history. The Hawk, 
however, in his fishing pursuits, sometimes mistakes his mark, 
or overrates his strength, by striking fish too large and power- 
ful for him to manage, by whom he is suddenly dragged under; 
and though he sometimes succeeds in extricating himself, after 
being taken three or four times down, yet oftener both parties 
perish. The bodies of sturgeon, and several other large fish, 
with that of the Fish-Hawk fast grappled in them, have at dif- 
ferent times been found dead on the shore, cast up by the waves. 
