80 
BIRDS OP PREY. 
though unjustly doomed to servitude, his address and 
industry raise him greatly above to his oppressor, so 
that he supplies himself and his young with a plentiful 
sustenance. His adroitness and docility in catching 
fish have also sometimes been employed by man for his 
advantage. 
Intent on exploring the sea for his food, he leaves the 
nest and proceeds directly to the scene of action, sail- 
ing round in easy and wide circles, and turning at 
times as on a pivot, apparently without exertion, while 
his long and curving wings seem scarcely in motion. # 
At the height of from 100 to 200 feet he continues to 
survey the bosom of the deep. Suddenly he checks his 
course and hovers in the air, with beating pinions ; he 
then descends with rapidity, but the wily victim has 
escaped. Now he courses near the surface, and by a 
dodging descent, scarcely wetting his feet, he seizes a 
fish, which he sometimes drops or yields to the greedy 
Eagle ; but, not discouraged, he again ascends in spiral 
sweeps, to regain the higher regions of the air, and re- 
new his survey of the watery expanse. His prey again 
espied, he descends perpendicularly like a falling plum- 
met, plunging into the sea with a loud rushing noise, 
and with an unerring aim. In an instant he emerges 
with the struggling prey in his talons, shakes off the wa- 
ter from his feathers, and now directs his laborious 
course to land, beating in the wind with all the skill of 
a practised seaman. The fish which he thus carries 
may be sometimes from 6 to 8 pounds ; and so firm some- 
times is the penetrating grasp of his talons, that when, 
by mistake, he engages with one which is too large, he is 
dragged beneath the waves, and at length both fish and 
bird perish. 
