And—
“An eagle flight, bold, and forth on,
Leaving no track behind.”
Timon of Athens, Act i. Sc. 1.
This last line recalls to mind the following allusion to the flight of the Jerfalcon:—“Then prone she dashes with so much velocity, that the impression of her path remains on the eye, in the same manner as that of the shooting meteor or flashing lightning, and you fancy that there is a torrent of falcon rushing for fathoms through the air.”[26]
Spenser, in the fifth book of his “Faerie Queene” (iv. 42), has depicted the grandeur of an eagle on the wing:—
“Like to an eagle in his kingly pride
Soring thro’ his wide empire of the aire
To weather his brode sailes.”
But notwithstanding his great powers of flight, we are reminded that the eagle is not always secure. Guns, traps, and other engines of destruction are directed against him, whenever and wheresoever opportunity occurs:—