EAGLES
"Speaking of birds, doctor, there are some big fellows around this
winter," said Burtis. "While in the mountains with the wood teams some
days since I saw a gray and a bald eagle sailing around, but could not
get a shot at them. As soon as it grows milder I am going up to the
cliffs on the river to see if I can get within rifle range."
"Oh, come, Burt, I thought you were too good a sportsman to make such a
mistake," the doctor rejoined. "A gray eagle is merely a young bald
eagle. We have only two species of the genuine eagle in this country, the
bald, or American, and the golden, or ring-tailed. The latter is very
rare, for their majesties are not fond of society, even of their own
kind, and two nests are seldom found within thirty miles of each other.
The bald eagle has been common enough, and I have shot many. One morning
long ago I shot two, and had quite a funny experience with one of them."
"Pray tell us about it," said Burtis, glad of a diversion from his
ornithological shortcomings.
"Well, one February morning (I could not have been much over fourteen at
the time) I crossed the river on the ice, and took the train for
Peekskill. Having transacted my business and procured a good supply of
ammunition, I started homeward. From the car windows I saw two eagles
circling over the cliffs of the lower Highlands, and with the rashness
and inexperience of a boy I determined to leave the train while it was
under full headway. I passed through to the rear car, descended to the
lowest step, and, without realizing my danger, watched for a level place
that promised well for the mad project. Such a spot soon occurring, I
grasped the iron rail tightly with my right hand, and with my gun in my
left I stepped off into the snow, which was wet and slushy. My foot
bounded up and back as if I had been india-rubber, and maintaining my
hold I streamed away behind the car in an almost horizontal position.
About once in every thirty feet my foot struck the ground, bounded up and
back, and I streamed away again as if I were towed or carried through the
air. After taking a few steps of this character, which exceeded any
attributed to giants in fairy-lore, I saw I was in for it, and the next
time my foot struck I let go, and splashed, with a force that I even now
ache to think of, into the wet snow. It's a wonder I didn't break my
neck, but I scrambled up not very much the worse for my tumble. There
were the eagles; my gun was all right, and that was all I cared for at
the time. I soon loaded, using the heaviest shot I had, and in a few
moments the great birds sailed over my head. I devoted a barrel to each,
and down they both came, fluttering, whirling, and uttering cries that
Wilson describes as something like a maniacal laugh. One lodged in the
top of a tall hemlock, and stuck; the other came flapping and crashing
through another tree until stopped by the lower limbs, where it remained.
I now saw that their distance had been so great that I had merely
disabled them, and I began reloading, but I was so wild from excitement
and exultation that I put in the shot first. Of course my caps only
snapped, and the eagle in the hemlock top, recovering a brief renewal of
strength after the shock of his wound, flew slowly and heavily away, and
fell on the ice near the centre of the river. I afterward learned that it
was carried off by some people on an ice-boat. The other eagle, whose wing
I had broken, now reached the ground, and I ran toward it, determined that
I should not lose both of my trophies. As I approached I saw that I had an
ugly customer to deal with, for the bird, finding that he could not escape,
threw himself on his back, with his tail doubled under him, and was
prepared to strike blows with talons and beak that would make serious
wounds, I resolved to take my game home alive, and after a little thought
cut a crotched stick, with which I held his head down while I fastened his
feet together. A man who now appeared walking down the track aided me in
securing the fierce creature, which task we accomplished by tying some
coarse bagging round his wings, body, and talons. I then went on to the
nearest station in order to take the train homeward. Of course the eagle
attracted a great deal of attention in the cars--more than he seemed to
enjoy, for he soon grew very restless. I was approaching my destination,
and three or four people were about me, talking, pointing, and trying to
touch the bird, when he made a sudden dive. The bagging round his wings and
feet gave way, and so did the people on every side. Down through the aisle,
flapping and screaming, went the eagle; and the ladies, with skirts
abridged, stood on the seats and screamed quite as discordantly. Not a man
present would help me, but, mounting on their seats, they vociferated
advice. The conductor appeared on the scene, and I said that if he would
head the bird off I would catch him. This he agreed to do, but he no sooner
saw the eagle bearing down on him with his savage eye and beak than he, as
nimbly at the best of them, hopped upon a seat, and stood beside a woman,
probably for her protection. A minute or two later the train stopped at my
station, and I was almost desperate. Fortunately I was in the last car, and
I drove my eagle toward the rear door, from which, by the vigorous use of
my feet, I induced him to alight on the ground--the first passenger of the
kind, I am sure, that ever left the cars at that station. After several
minor adventures, I succeeded in getting him home. I hoped to keep him
alive, but he would not eat; so I stuffed him in the only way I could, and
he is now one of my specimens."
"Well," said Burt, laughing, "that exceeds any eagle adventure that I
have heard of in this region. In the car business you certainly brought
his majesty down to the prose of common life, and I don't wonder the
regal bird refused to eat thereafter."
"Cannot eagles be tamed--made gentle and friendly?" old Mrs. Clifford
asked. "I think I remember hearing that you had a pet eagle years ago."
"Yes, I kept one--a female--six months. She was an unusually large
specimen, and measured about eight feet with wings extended. The females of
all birds of prey, you know, are larger than the males. As in the former
case, I had broken one of her wings, and she also threw herself on her back
and made her defence in the most savage manner. Although I took every
precaution in my power, my hands were bleeding in several places before I
reached home, and, in fact, she kept them in a rather dilapidated condition
all the time I had her. I placed her in a large empty room connected with
the barn, and found her ready enough to eat. Indeed, she was voracious, and
the savage manner in which she tore and swallowed her food was not a
pleasant spectacle. I bought several hundred live carp--a cheap, bony
fish--and put them in a ditch where I could take them with a net as I
wanted them. The eagle would spring upon a fish, take one of her long hops
into a corner, and tear off its head with one stroke of her beak. While I
was curing her broken wing the creature tolerated me after a fashion, but
when she was well she grew more and more savage and dangerous. Once a
Dutchman, who worked for us, came in with me, and the way the eagle chased
that man around the room and out of the door, he swearing meanwhile in high
German and in a high key, was a sight to remember. I was laughing
immoderately, when the bird swooped down on my shoulder, and the scars
would have been there to-day had not her talons been dulled by their
constant attrition with the boards of her extemporized cage. Covering my
face with my arm--for she could take one's eye out by a stroke of her
beak--I also retreated. She then dashed against the window with such force
that she bent the wood-work and broke every pane of glass. She seemed so
wild for freedom that I gave it to her, but the foolish creature, instead
of sailing far away, lingered on a bluff near the river, and soon boys and
men were out after her with shot-guns. I determined that they should not
mangle her to no purpose, and so, with the aid of my rifle, I added her
also to my collection of specimens."
"Have you ever found one of their nests?" Webb asked.
"Yes. They are rather curious affairs, and are sometimes five feet in
diameter each way, and quite flat at the top. They use for the substratum
of the domicile quite respectable cord-wood sticks, thicker than one's
wrist. The mother-bird must be laying her eggs at this season, cold as it
is. But they don't mind the cold, for they nest above the Arctic Circle."
"I don't see how it is possible for them to protect their eggs and young
in such severe weather," Mrs. Clifford remarked.
"Nature takes care of her own in her own way," replied the doctor, with a
slight shrug. "One of the birds always remains on the nest."
"Well," said Squire Bartley, who had listened rather impatiently to so
much talk about an unprofitable bird, "I wish my hens were laying now.
Seems to me that Nature does better by eagles and crows than by any fowls
I ever had. Good-night, friends."
With a wistful glance at Amy's pure young face, and a sigh so low that
only pitiful Mrs. Leonard heard it, Mr. Alvord also bowed himself out in
his quiet way.
"Doctor," said Burtis, resolutely, "you have excited my strongest
emulation, and I shall never be content until I have brought down an
eagle or two."
"Dear me!" cried the doctor, looking at his watch, "I should think that
you would have had enough of eagles, and of me also, by this time.
Remember, Miss Amy, I prescribe birds, but don't watch a bald-eagle's
nest too closely. We are not ready to part with your bright eyes any more
than you are."