THE GOLDEN EAGLE.

IT might be supposed, from the name given to this bird, that its appearance resembled the most precious of metals, but this does not exactly accord with the fact. The descriptions given of it by naturalists are various. Latham says, that the head and neck are deep brown; Fleming affirms, that the acuminated feathers on the head and neck are a bright rust-colour, and the rest of the plumage dusky brown; while Buffon asserts, that the plumage is at first white, then faint yellow, and that afterwards it becomes a bright copper colour. Still there are cases in which the name is not inapplicable. Mr. Perkins, of Lee, in Kent, possessed an eagle having the peculiar shade of russet yellow which gold when alloyed with copper exhibits; so that the feathers looked as if they had been powdered with gold dust. Others have been observed as presenting a similar appearance. White varieties of the golden eagle, as it is called, have also been seen and recorded.

In times far distant it was said, "Doth the eagle

mount up at thy command, and make her nest on high? She dwelleth and abideth on the rock, upon the crag of the rock, and the strong place. From thence she seeketh the prey, and her eyes behold afar off," Job xxxix. 27-29. The nest made by this bird is, in fact, a collection of strong sticks, laid on the highest and most inaccessible parts of rocks, and requiring a space of several square feet. Hence it has been said by one of our

poets:

"The tawny eagle seats his callow brood

High on the cliff, and feasts his young with blood:
On Snowdon's rocks, or Orkney's wide domain,
Whose beetling cliffs o'erhang the western main,
The royal bird his lonely kingdom forms
Amidst the gathering clouds and sullen storms;
Through the wide waste of air he darts his sight,
And holds his sounding pinions poised for flight;
With cruel eye premeditates the war,
And marks his destined victim from afar.
Descending in a whirlwind to the ground,
His pinions, like a rush of waters, sound;
The fairest of the fold he bears away,
And to his nest compels the struggling prey:
He scorns the game by meanest hunters tore,
And dips his talons in no vulgar gore."

The range of the eagle is, however, very extensive : not only is it found in various parts of the United Kingdom, particularly in Scotland, but in America, from the temperate to the arctic regions, always preferring a mountainous country; in North Africa, and Asia Minor;

in the Alps, the Pyrenees, and the forests of Fontainbleau. In some parts, successive generations have observed pairs nestling on the same cliffs.

The attention of the parent bird to her eaglets has often been noticed. Sir Humphrey Davy had an opportunity of witnessing the instructions given, and has thus stated the fact:

It was

"I once saw a very interesting sight above one of the crags of Ben Nevis, as I was going, on the 20th of August, in the pursuit of black game. Two parent eagles were teaching their offspring, two young birds, the manœuvres of flight. They began by rising from the top of a mountain, in the eye of the sun. about mid-day, and bright for this climate. They at first made small circles, and the young birds imitated them. They paused on their wings, waiting till they had made their first flight, and then took a second and larger gyration, always rising towards the sun, and enlarging their circle of flight, so as to make a gradually extending spiral. The young ones still slowly followed, apparently flying better as they mounted; and they continued this sublime kind of exercise, always rising, till they became mere points in the air, and the young ones were lost, and afterwards their parents, to our aching sight."