The golden eagle is an inhabitant of the Rocky Mountains, but is very seldom seen farther eastward. Audubon reports having noticed single pairs in the Alleghanies, in Maine, and even in the valley of the Hudson; but such examples are very rare, for this royal bird is truly a creature of the mountains. It fears neither cold nor tempestuous winds nor icy solitudes.
The eagle's plume is an old and famous decoration of warriors and chieftains, and is constantly alluded to, especially in Scottish legend and song. The Northwestern Indians ornament their headdresses and their weapons with the tail feathers of the eagle, and institute hunts for the bird with the sole purpose of obtaining them. Indians prize these feathers so highly that they will barter a valuable horse for the tail of a single bird.
Royal and noble in its bearing, the eagle has naturally been chosen as the symbol of majesty and power. It served as one of the imperial emblems of ancient Rome, and is employed at the present time for the regal insignia of different countries. The bald eagle, the national bird of the United States, belongs to the same great family as its golden cousin, and is a sharer of its lordly characteristics.
THE HIDDEN BEAUTIES OF THE SNOW
In the falling of the snow we have snow showers and snow storms. In the snow shower the air is filled with light, fleecy flakes, which descend gently and noiselessly through it, and either melt away and disappear as fast as they alight, or else, when the temperature is below the point of freezing, slowly accumulate upon every surface where they can gain a lodgment, until the fields are everywhere covered with a downy fleece of spotless purity, and every salient point—the tops of the fences and posts, the branches of the trees, and the interminable lines of telegraph wire—are adorned with a white and dazzling trimming. In such a fall of snow as this the delicate process of crystallization is not disturbed by any agitations in the air. The feathery needles from each little nucleus extend themselves in every direction as far as they will, and combining by gentle contacts with others floating near them, form large and fleecy flakes, involving the nicest complications of structure, and filling the air with a kind of beauty in which the expression of softness and gracefulness is combined with that of mathematical symmetry and precision.