Falco leucocephalus, Linn.
PLATE CXXVI. Young.

Although I have already given a long account of the adult of this species, in the first volume of my biographies, I have thought it necessary, not only to figure the young, but also to offer you some of the observations relative to the habits of this handsome and powerful bird, which I have collected in the course of my long rambles. These I select from among the many recorded in my journals, giving the preference to those which seem most likely to interest you.

St John's River, East Florida, 7th February 1832.—I observed four nests of the White-headed Eagle this day, while the United States' schooner Spark lay at anchor not far from the shore. They were at no great distance from each other, and all placed on tall live pine-trees. Our commander, Lieutenant Piercey of our Navy, having at that time little to do, as he lay waiting the flood-tide, a boat was manned, and several of us went on shore. On approaching the nearest nest, we saw two young birds standing erect on its edge, while their parents were perched on the branches above them. As we went nearer, the old ones flew off silently, while the young did not seem to pay the least attention to us, this being a part of the woods where probably no white man had ever before put his foot, and the Eaglets having as yet had no experience of the barbarity of the race. The captain took the first shot: one of the birds was severely wounded, and tumbled half way from the nest towards the ground, when it recovered, flapped its wings, and suddenly sailed away until we lost sight of it as it flew into the woods. I marked its course, however. One of the sailors was told to shoot the other, which had not moved from its position; he missed it; and as I saw it make movements indicative of its surprise and fear, I fired, but wounded it so slightly in one pinion, that it was enabled to fly off in an irregular manner towards the river. This I judged was the first attempt it had ever made to fly. I followed its course with my eye, and after in vain waiting a long time for a shot at the old birds, I went in search of it, while the rest of the party pursued the other. After some time I reached our boat, and at the same instant was surprised to see the wounded bird perched on a low stump within half gun shot. I fired, and the bird fell, but before I reached the spot, it flew off again and tumbled into the river, where, in this to it new and wonderful element, it flapped its wings, and made way so fast, that I took to the water and brought it ashore, my faithful Newfoundland dog Plato being on board, quite lamed by having brought me birds some days before from banks of racoon oysters. After all, it was necessary to knock the bird on the head, which done I returned to the party, none of whom had yet found their prey, they having disagreed as to the course it had taken. Being somewhat of a woodsman, I pointed towards the place where I thought the bird must be, and after a few hundred yards walking among palmettoes, Spanish bayonets, sword-grass, and other disagreeable undergrowth, we discovered the poor bird gasping in its last agonies. On examining their bodies we found both well supplied with shot, and I became more assured than ever of the hardiness of the species.

On the same river, 8th February.—We visited another nest, on which, by the aid of a telescope, we saw three young ones in the posture described above. The bird first shot fell back in the nest and there remained: it was struck by a bullet. The next was so severely wounded that it clung outside the nest, until fired at a second time, when it fell. The third was killed, as it was preparing to fly off. Our axes being dull, the tree large, and a fair breeze springing up, we returned to the Spark, where in a few hours these young birds were skinned, cooked, and eaten, by those who had been "in at the death." They proved good eating, the flesh resembling veal in taste and tenderness. One of us only did not taste of the dish, simply I believe from prejudice. The contents of the stomachs of these young Eagles were large fragments of cat-fish heads and bones of quadrupeds and birds. We frequently saw old birds of the species sail down to the surface of the water, and rise holding in their talons heads of cat-fishes which abounded on the water and were rejected, as the inhabitants assured us, by the alligators, who content themselves with the best part, the tail, leaving the heads to such animals as can dissect them and escape the dangerous sharp bony guards placed near the gills, and which the fish has the power of firmly fixing at right angles as if they were a pair of small bayonets. Should this really be a general habit of the alligator, it indicates his faculty of gaining knowledge by experience, or of having it naturally implanted. I could easily distinguish the sex of all the young Eagles of this species which we procured. The females were not only larger, but almost black, whilst the males were much lighter and of less weight.

Some weeks afterwards, when young Eagles would have been thought a dainty even by our most prejudiced companions—for you must not suppose, reader, that every student of nature meets with "pigs ready roasted" in our woods—we saw an old White-headed Eagle perched on a tall tree at the edge of the river. While admiring its posture, by means of a telescope, and marking its eye keenly bent towards the water, it suddenly dropped like a stone from its perch, almost immersed its body into the stream, and rose with a large trout, with which it scrambled to the shore. Our captain, his first lieutenant, my assistant, and your humble servant, were present on this occasion, and saw it very composedly eat the fish, after shaking the water from its plumage. I must add that never before had I seen this bird plunge into the water, although I had several times seen it scrambling after small fishes in shallows and gravel banks.

February 29th.—I saw some Fish-Hawks defend themselves, and chase away from their nests the Bald Eagle. The former were incubating, and the latter, as well as some Turkey Buzzards, were anxiously trying to rob the nest, wherever they found the Fisher Bird absent from its tenement. The Fish-hawks at last collected from different parts of the river, and I felt great pleasure in seeing these brave birds actually drive away their cowardly enemies. The Fish-Hawk had only eggs in that country when the young of the Eagle were large and fully able to fly.

Bay of Fundy, 10th May 1833.—While admiring the extraordinary boldness of the rocky shores of this perhaps most wonderful of all bays, and trying to discover in what manner the stupendous natural fortifications are connected with the formidable tides that dash against them, I observed Crows, Ravens, and the White-headed Eagle, leisurely feeding on mussels and sea-eggs. The rocks were clad towards their summits with melancholy firs, of which each broken branch told of a tempest; slimy sea-weeds hung sluggishly over the waters; and, as each successive wave retired, banks of shells were exposed to view, closely impacted, and conveying to my mind the idea of gigantic honeycombs.

Labrador, July 1833.—The White-headed Eagle is unknown in this country, although many Fish-Hawks are found here, and I saw several of their nests, placed on the low fir trees.

Boston, Massachusetts, 21st November 1832.—This morning I received the following letter from my learned friend Jacob Bigelow, Esq. M.D.—"Dear Sir, about sixteen years since, a large eagle, Falco leucocephalus, belonging to the Linnean Society of this city, was sentenced to contribute to a cabinet of natural history. A variety of experiments was made with a view to destroy him without injuring his plumage, and a number of mineral poisons were successively given him in large doses, but without effect. At length a drachm of corrosive sublimate of mercury was inclosed in a small fish, and given him to eat. After swallowing the whole of this, he continued to appearance perfectly well, and free from inconvenience. The next day an equal quantity of white arsenic was given him, without any greater effect; so that in the end the refractory bird was obliged to be put to death by mechanical means. The experiments were made by Dr Hayward and myself, in presence of other members of the Society. Very truly, your obedient servant, Jacob Bigelow."

I have now no doubt that in a state of confinement, this species sometimes requires a long series of years before it attains the full adult plumage, by which it is so distinctly characterized. There is now one living in the suburbs of Philadelphia, which was eight years in coming to this state of maturity. Almost every person who saw it, while yet in its brown dress, called it either a new species or a Golden Eagle! Nay some said that it must be "the pretended Bird of Washington!" My constant and most worthy friend, Dr Richard Harlan, took me to see it. I felt assured as to the species, and told him that its head and bill would become white, and that its size, which was rather larger than common, was not such as to indicate a different species. I offered a wager of one thousand dollars in support of my assertions, but the Doctor wisely declined meeting me on this ground. Four years afterwards, when this bird was eight years of age, it moulted, and the head and tail assumed a pure white colour. Dr Harlan, in one of his letters, dated 26th April 1831, says, "I wish I could walk with you this moment to M'Arran's garden, to shew you how white the head of the eagle, which we talked of betting about, has at last become, as well as his tail; but he must have been at least nine or ten years old first." This very eagle happened to have each of his middle claws of a whitish colour, and his owner would fain have persuaded me that it was a new bird, on the assertion, as he said, of a well-known ornithologist residing in Philadelphia, who has since published a description of it under a new and very curious name. The proprietor of this famed bird valued it at one hundred dollars, I at one!

While at the lovely village of Columbia, in South Carolina, Dr Robert W. Gibbes, a man of taste and talent, as well as one who loves the science of birds for its own sake, kept one of these Eagles for some time in his aviary, and, being desirous of granting it more liberty, cut across all the primary quills of one of its wings, and turned it loose in his yard. No sooner was the bird at liberty, than it deliberately pulled out the stump of each mutilated quill, in consequence of which the wing was soon furnished anew. The Doctor told me that his first intention was to draw them out himself, but this he found so difficult that he gave it up. Do birds possess a power of contracting the sheaths of their feathers so powerfully as to prevent their being pulled without great force?

Since my earliest acquaintance with birds, I have felt assured of the ignoble spirit of the White-headed Eagle, and the following fact strengthens the impression. William W. Kunhardt, Esq. of Charleston, S. C., kept one of these birds (a full-grown male) for many months. He one day put a game-cock into its cage, to see how the prisoner would conduct himself. The gallant cock at once set to, and beat the eagle in the "handsomest manner," his opponent giving in at each blow, without paying the least regard to the established rules of combat. Other cocks of the common race proved equally formidable to the degraded robber of the Fish-Hawk.

The White-headed Eagle seldom utters its piercing cry without throwing its head backward until it nearly touches the feathers of the back. It then opens its bill, and its tongue is seen to move as it emits its notes, of which five or six are delivered in rapid succession. Although loud and disagreeable when heard at hand, they have a kind of melancholy softness when listened to at a great distance. When these birds are irritated, and on the wing, they often thrust forth their talons, opening and closing them, as if threatening to tear the object of their anger in pieces.

The synonyms and necessary references having been already given in the first volume (page 169), it is unnecessary to repeat them here. Wilson figured and described the young of the White-headed Eagle under the name of the Sea Eagle, Falco ossifragus, although not without expressing doubts.

The Young Bird fully fledged is represented in Plate CXXVI.

In this state it differs greatly in its colours from the F. ossifragus or young of the F. albicilla of Europe, with which it was confounded by Wilson.

The bill is black above, bluish-grey towards the end of the lower mandible, the cere, the base of the lower mandible, and the soft margins of the bill at the angle, yellow tinged with green. The narrow elongated feathers of the head and neck are dark-brown tipped with dull white, and the general colour of the plumage above is dull hair-brown; the lower parts having the feathers deep brown, broadly margined with greyish-white. The quills are deep brown, and the tail-feathers are brownish white, minutely mottled with dark brown, and having their extremities of that colour. The iris is yellowish-brown, the feet greenish-yellow, the claws black.

The Adult birds have been described in vol. i. of the present work, p. 169.