16 THE AUDUBON BULLE EIEN 
close to the planter’s home, and accepting his hospitality year after year. 
In that region no citizen, or his children, has any feeling for the familiar 
bird but friendliness. All know that the osprey eats nothing but fish, which 
it seizes near the surface of river or inlet, and they enjoy the bird’s graceful 
flight as it soars and hovers at its fishing. The planter and his unlearned 
helpers, alike, respect the right of the bird to live. They like to see it 
around, and do not begrudge it an occasional fish. They distinguish the 
osprey from the eagle, our national emblem, and respect them equally. 
Alexander Wilson, more than a century ago, wrote a poem setting forth 
the friendliness existing between the rural fisherman and the fish-hawk. 
But times have changed. The fisherman’s boy, perhaps, has become a city 
resident, and, whether reporter or mere idler with a gun, may see nothing 
in either eagle or osprey but a predacious bird that makes a tempting mark, 
or a bird that he regards as a vicious enemy of mankind. 
Of course, eagles as attacker of helpless babes are nothing new—in 
print. Since early times, folklore and love of publicity have combined to 
produce stories of babes captured by eagles, and artists have depicted them 
in the act. In the stories of early times, the babe might be carried away 
just as the frantic mother rushed out of her mountain chalet, or it might 
be shown lying in the aerie, about to become food for the young eagles. 
In more modern times these child “victims” have grown larger and heavier. 
We now read newspaper accounts of half-grown boys and girls who have 
escaped death by a hair’s breadth. 
In the meantime the food habits and the powers of the eagles have been 
studied. The carrying ability of birds of exceptional strength has been 
tested. In all the voluminous literature one will find not one authentic 
account of an eagle carrying away a child, although boys weighing up to 
thirty-five pounds may figure in the tales. But in an actual test a tame 
golden eagle, given a flying start fifteen feet from the ground, carried an 
eight-pound weight only fourteen yards before he was forced to the ground. 
As for the osprey recently publicized as an eagle in the District of 
Columbia, it may have been sick or injured. It had earlier landed on the 
porch of a house, whose occupant kicked at the bird and complained that 
the fish-hawk “showed fight.” 
It would seem that the reporters, and particularly editors, by this time, 
should know better than to print such silly fiction. Such stories cannot 
help but perpetuate old wive’s tales and prejudices against hawks, owls and 
eagles, most of which are now proved beyond question to be beneficial 
birds.—Nature Magazine, January, 1943. 
hat ft 1 
MEMBERS AND guests of the Society who were present at the Chicago 
Academy of Sciences to hear the lecture “Wild Wings” by Mr. Murl Deusing 
on Friday evening, April 23, were most enthusiastie in their response. We 
hope that the Society may at some time have the privilege of again present- 
ing Mr. Deusing to the bird-minded people of Chicago. 
