Upon our word, we begin to believe that we ourselves deserve the name of Poietes much better than the gentleman who at threescore had never seen an eagle. "She has fallen from a great height," quoth the gentleman—"What an extraordinary sight!" he continueth—while we are mute as the oar suspended by the up-gazing Celt, whose quiet eye brightens as it pursues the Bird to her eyrie in the cliff over the cove where the red-deer feed.
Poietes having given vent to his emotions in such sublime exclamations—"Look at the bird!" "What an extraordinary sight!" might have thenceforth held his tongue, and said no more about eagles. But Halieus cries, "There! you see her rise with a fish in her talons"—and Poietes, very simply, or rather like a simpleton, returns for answer, "She gives an interest which I hardly expected to have found in this scene. Pray, are there many of these animals in this country?" A poet hardly expecting to find interest in such a scene as a great Highland loch—Loch Maree! "Pray, are there many of these hanimals in this country?" Loud cries of Oh! oh! oh! No doubt an eagle is an animal; like Mr Cobbett or Mr O'Connell—"a very fine animal;" but we particularly, and earnestly, and anxiously, request Sir Humphry Davy not to call her so again—but to use the term bird, or any other term he chooses, except animal. Animal, a living creature, is too general, too vague by far; and somehow or other it offends our ear shockingly when applied to an eagle. We may be wrong, but in a trifling matter of this kind Sir Humphry surely will not refuse our supplication. Let him call a horse an animal, if he chooses—or an ass—or a cow—but not an eagle—as he loves us, not an eagle; let him call it a bird—the Bird of Jove—the Queen or King of the Sky—or anything else he chooses—but not an animal—no—no—no—not an animal, as he hopes to prosper, to be praised in Maga, embalmed and immortalised.
Neither ought Poietes to have asked if there were "many of these animals" in this country. He ought to have known that there are not many of these animals in any country. Eagles are proud—apt to hold their heads very high—and to make themselves scarce. A great many eagles all flying about together would look most absurd. They are aware of that, and fly in "ones and twos"—a couple perhaps to a county. Poietes might as well have asked Mungo Park if there were a great many lions in Africa. Mungo, we think, saw but one; and that was one too much. There were probably a few more between Sego and Timbuctoo—but there are not a "great many of those animals in that country"—though quite sufficient for the purpose. How the Romans contrived to get at hundreds for a single show, perplexes our power of conjecture.
Halieus says—with a smile on his lip surely—in answer to the query of Poietes—"Of this species I have seen but these two; and, I believe, the young ones migrate as soon as they can provide for themselves; for this solitary bird requires a large space to move and feed in, and does not allow its offspring to partake its reign, or to live near it." This is all pretty true, and known to every child rising or risen six, except poor Poietes. He had imagined that there were "many of these animals in this country," that they all went a-fishing together as amicably as five hundred sail of Manksmen among a shoal of herrings.
Throughout these Dialogues we have observed that Ornither rarely opens his mouth. Why so taciturn? On the subject of birds he ought, from his name, to be well informed; and how could he let slip an opportunity, such as will probably never be afforded him again in this life, of being eloquent on the Silver Eagle? Ornithology is surely the department of Ornither. Yet there is evidently something odd and peculiar in his idiosyncrasy; for we observe that he never once alludes to "these animals," birds, during the whole excursion. He has not taken his gun with him into the Highlands, a sad oversight indeed in a gentleman who "is to be regarded as generally fond of the sports of the field." Flappers are plentiful over all the moors about the middle of July; and hoodies, owls, hawks, ravens, make all first-rate shooting to sportsmen not over anxious about the pot. It is to be presumed, too, that he can stuff birds. What noble specimens might he not have shot for Mr Selby! On one occasion, "the Silver Eagle" is preying in a pool within slug range, and there is some talk of shooting him—we suppose with an oar, or the butt of a fishing-rod, for the party have no firearms—but Poietes insists on sparing his life, because "these animals" are a picturesque accompaniment to the scenery, and "give it an interest which he had not expected to find" in mere rivers, lochs, moors, and mountains. Genus Falco must all the while have been laughing in his sleeve at the whole party—particularly at Ornither—who, to judge from his general demeanour, may be a fair shot with number five at an old newspaper expanded on a barn-door twenty yards off, but never could have had the audacity to think in his most ambitious mood of letting off his gun at an Eagle.
But further, Halieus, before he took upon him to speak so authoritatively about eagles, should have made himself master of their names and natures. He is manifestly no scientific ornithologist. We are. The general question concerning Eagles in Scotland may now be squeezed into very small compass. Exclusive of the true Osprey (Falco Haliætus), which is rather a larger fishing-hawk than an eagle, there are two kinds, viz.—the Golden Eagle (F. Chrysaëtos), and the White-Tailed or Cinerous Eagle (F. Albicilla). The other two nominal species are disposed of in the following manner:—First, the Ring-Tailed Eagle (F. Fulvus) is the young of the Golden Eagle, being distinguished in early life by having the basal and central portion of the tail white, which colour disappears as the bird attains the adult state. Second, the $1 (F. Ossifragus), commonly so called, is the young of the White-tailed Eagle above named, from which it differs in having a brown tail; for in this species the white of the tail becomes every year more apparent as the bird increases in age, whereas, in the Golden Eagle, the white altogether disappears in the adult.
It is to the Ring-Tailed Eagle, and, by consequence, to the $1, that the name of Black Eagle is applied in the Highlands.
The White-tailed or Sea Eagle, as it becomes old, attains, in addition to the pure tail, a pale or bleached appearance, from which it may merit and obtain the name of Grey or Silver Eagle, as Sir Humphry Davy chooses to call it; but it is not known among naturalists by that name. There is no other species, however, to which the name can apply; and, therefore, Sir Humphry has committed the very gross mistake of calling the Grey or Silver Eagle (to use his own nomenclature) a very rare Eagle, since it is the most common of all the Scots, and also—a fortiori—of all the English Eagles—being in fact the Sea Eagle of the Highlands.
It preys often on fish dead or alive; but not exclusively, as it also attacks young lambs, and drives off the ravens from carrion prey, being less fastidious in its diet than the Golden Eagle, which probably kills its own meat—and has been known to carry off children; for a striking account of one of which hay-field robberies you have but a few minutes to wait.
As to its driving off its young, its habits are probably similar in this respect to other birds of prey, none of which appear to keep together in families after the young can shift for themselves; but we have never met with any one who has seen them in the act of driving. It is stated vaguely, in all books, of all eagles.