*^ >t/ "14^7** ^/ 1^ x^ \ ■^ ¥ FOR THE PEOPLE FOR EDVCATION FOR SCIENCE LIBRARY OF THE AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY OOTHECA WOLLEYANA: AN ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE OF e, THE COLLECTION OF BIRDS' EGGS FORMED BY THE LATE JOHN WOLLEY, Jun., M.A., F.Z.S. EDITED FROM THE ORIGINAL NOTES BT ALPUED NEWTON, M.A., E.L.S., etc. PART I. ACCIPITRES. LONDON: JOHN VAN VOORST, PATERNOSTER ROW. M.DCCC.LXIV. [Price £1 Us. 6f/.] OOTHECA WOLLEYANA: AN ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE THE COLLECTION OF BIRDS' EGGS FORMED BY THE LATE JOHN WOLLEY, Jun., M.A., F.Z.S. KDITEIl FROM THE ORIGIXAL NOTES ALFRED NEWTON, M.A., E.L.S., etc. PART I. ACCIPITRES. LONDON: JOHN VAN VOORST, PATERNOSTER ROW M.DCCC.LXIV. Vail, IIS. PRINTED BY TAYLOH AND FBANCIS, RKD LION COURT, FLEET STREET. TO THE REVEREND JOHN WOLLEY^ M.A., OF BEESTON, NOTTS., AS AN ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF HIS GENEROSITY IN FULFILLING THE LAST WISHES OF HIS SON, THE NATURALIST WHOSE LABOURS ARE HEREIN RECORDED, THIS WORK IS INSCRIBED BY THE EDITOR. 20th November, 1863. PREFACE TO PART 1. Reserving, until the completion of my duties as Editor, a detailed introduction to this work, it is yet necessary for nie to prefix to the portion of it which first sees the light a few words in explanation of my motives in publishing it. The late Mr. John Wolley, after spending nearly all his life in the pursuit of Natural History, died, as is well known to ornithologists, at the early age of thirty-six years. Shortly before his death, he requested that his Oological Col- lection, the formation of which had latterly been his chief occu- pation, should be handed over to me ; and this wish was fully carried out by his father. As soon as I heard of the desire my deceased friend and fellow-traveller had expressed, I began to consider how I could best make use of the valuable pro- perty which was to be entrusted to me ; and after consulting on the subject with Mr. P. L. Sclater, the Secretary of the Zoolo- gical Society of London, I came to the conclusion that I should be most advantageously serving the interest of Ornithology by publishing from Mr. Wolley's note-books a complete Catalogue of the contents of his Egg-Cabinet. Mr. Wolley's life had been one of so active a nature, and his death was, until a few weeks before it took place, so entirely unexpected, that he had VI PREFACE. had but few opportunities of making known to the world the results of his labours. To prevent these results from being lost to science was my main object ; and it appeared to me that this would be effectually attained by the compilation of a Catalogue such as the present, which should embrace as far as possible all the information he had gathered, whether extracted from letters addressed to his friends, from fragmentary diaries, or from detached memorandums, as well as that which was contained in his ' Egg-book,' — this latter being the principal record of his experience, and having been, with some few ex- ceptions, most carefully kept for many years. In preparing this work for the press, the plan I have adopted has been to bring together systematically all the notes relating to the same species, and arrange them for the most part in the order of the time at which they were written. I have not scrupled to add an account of such specimens as I have lately ob- tained, and of those which were included in the joint collection formed by my brother Edward and myself, prior to its incor- poration with the contents of Mr. Wolley's cabinets. In doing this, I beheve I have only acted as my late friend would have wished ; for I am sure that, in leaving his collection to me, he expected that I should continue to make it as perfect as I could. These interpolations, however, are in all cases typo- graphically distinguished from Mr. Wolley's text; so that there is no fear of my words being mistaken for his. I regret being unable to give even an approximate estimate of the extent of the ' Ootheca WoUeyana.' I am well aware that uncertainty on this point will be as unfavourable to myself as it may be inconvenient to the public. I shall endeavour to PREFACE. VU publish the Second Part of the work on the 1st December next, and this I hope may contain the whole of the Ckmaiores and Oscines which I shall have occasion to include. Mr. Wol- ley's collection was confined to Eurojjean species : it has been my intention to extend its limits to those of the western half of the Palaearctic Region, as being a district more naturally defined. The subjects from which the plates have been drawn are, in every case, solely illustrative of the collection as it now stands. I must here return my best thanks to all the artists who have assisted me in their production, and especially to Mr. Wolf, whose liberality in placing at my disposal the paintings from which three of the engravings have been taken, and whose kindness in superintending the execution of the rest, are only equalled by the faithful eff'ects of his marvellous pencil. A. N. MaGDAI.KNK Coi,l,Ki>K, f".\MRRID«K, A PR IT. 18r4. OOTHECA WOLLEYANA. NEOPHRON PERCNOPTERUS (Limiajus). EGYPTIAN VULTURE. ^ 1. One. — Tangier, April 1845. From M. Favier's Collection, 1846. Hewitson, ' Eggs of British Birds,' pi. i. One day, diu'ing my stay at Tangier, September 1845, after an inquiry about some monkeys, I was taken by Hamet, my guardian Moor, to a patio (courtyard) round which lived in apparent harmony a Jewish, a Moorish, and a French family. The latter consisted of a solitary individual, who dealt in monkeys, and who also skinned boars' heads, jackals, ichneumons, and other trophies of the Consul's shooting- parties. He showed me a quantity of birds' skins, well preserved, and, as far as my knowledge went, correctly named from a copy of Temminck's ' Manuel ' that he greatly prized. Upon my asking for eggs, he produced some ; and he assured me that all of them that were named had had the mother killed over them. Every egg that 1 knew was correctly named, Avith the trifling exception of a Goatsucker's, marked Turdus merula ; and so 1 was fortunate enough to procure eggs of the Little Bustard, Stilt, Pratincole, and Bee-eater. The only eggs 1 felt in doubt about were four, marked Cathartes percnojitei'iis. I fully believed that this bird laid a white egg ; and I did not think it could be so small as these. However, M. Favier (for that Avas the Frenchman's name) assured me that the old one was killed off one of the nests, was bought by Mr. Sandford, and is now in England. I was also show a a nestling young one. The eggs were taken in different years, as the dates 1843 and 1845 on them testified; two single ones; the other two, — each, as he said, " half of a complete nest." In fine, he " gave for false " aU that had ever been written aljout the e^^ of this bird, asserted that it was unknown iu Paris or in Loudon, and that B 2 NEOPHRON PERCNOPTERUS. he intended to publish a book himself. However, in the then state of my finances, I declined his price, " sept piastres fortes d'Espagne," i. e. seven dollars. I heard well of M. Favier, and that he was patronized by the late much-lamented British Consul, Mr. Edward Drummond-Hay. On my retirrn to Cambridge I consulted Audubon and other authorities. I found that the eggs of the Black Vulture of North America (a bird not far different in size from the percnoptervs) are small, and marked with large irregular dashes of black and dark brown towards the larger end ; that they never exceed two ; and also that they are more elongated, as well as sharper at the smaller end, than those of the Turkey Buzzard (Ornithological Biography, vol. ii. p. 51, and vol. V. p. 346) . Hence, notwithstanding the authorities quoted by ]\Ir. Yarrell, and the figure originally given by Mr. He^\^t- son', I thought the egg of the percno2Jterus might follow the tendency of other Vultures^ eggs — of the Black Vulture according to Audubon, of the Turkey Buzzard according to Wilson, of the Bearded and the Griffon Vultures according to Temminck — and be a coloiired one. This last difficulty removed, I thought there was scarcely room for doubting the authenticity of M. Fa\ier's eggs. I accordingly wrote for the two most opposite varieties of them, and, by the kindness of several friends, I received them safe. On opening the box, they looked so like some large Hawks' eggs, that my doubts revived, and were not dispelled until, in consequence of an accidental inquiry put to me by Mr. Wilmot, that gentleman furnished me with an account of what he already knew on the subject ; and I was also favoured with a sight of a drawing made by M. Moquin-Tandon from a specimen at Toulouse. This drawing is evidently taken from an egg similar to mine, and intermediate in size between them ; at one end it is somewhat pointed, at the other end blunt. One of my eggs (that figured by Mr. Hewitson, and the subject of this note) is inclined to be peaked at both ends; the other, taken in April 1843, which I have given to Mr. Wilmot, is considerably less, and almost a perfect oval. This would come very near Wilson's description of that of Cathartes aura. M. Moquin-Tandon' s communication, dated "Jardin des Plantes, Toulouse, Sept. 6, 1843," was as follows : — " L'annee derniere, du Crau d' Aries, on decouvrit deux nids, contenant chacun deux oeufs : deux furent deposes au Musee d' Avignon. Cette annee, sur le Pic de St. Loup, pres de Montpellier, on a trouve un troisieme nid de cet oiseau : il ne contenait qu'un CEuf." M. Favier, in a work in his hands 1 [This figure -svas in plate i. of the ' Eggs of British Birds/ 1st ed., which was sub equently cancelled by the author, to be replaced, a.s above quoted, by a figure of the subject of the present note. — Ed.] NEOPHRON PERCNOPTERUS, 3 that has not yet seen the day, states that " the percnopterus makes its nest at the end of March, in the crevices and in the caves of rocks, usually in inaccessible places in a perpendicular cliff. It lays in the mouth of April, one or two eggs of a variable form. It hatches at the end of May ; and the young (always one or two in number) are not of age to take their flight until July." The " one or two eggs " agrees with the account of M. Moquin-Tandon, and of that given by Bruce (Travels to the Sources of the Nile, App. p. 164-) ; but the time spent in the nest does not come up to the " four months " of Bruce, though, from the small size of the e^^, we might expect it to be long. The Condor, the Black Vulture, and probably most Vultures, appear to lay two eggs only ; and it is also said of them that they make no nest (Darwin, ' Zoology of the " Beagle " Voyage,' part iii. p. 4 ; Audubon, ' Ornithological Biography,' vol. ii. p. 54). Does our bird form its own nest ? In Barbary, the Egjqotian Vulture probably breeds only in the mountains of the interior, as it was not known to Mr. John Drummond-Hay, then Her Britannic Majesty's Consul at Tan- gier. Mr. Hewitson writes, " I have not the slightest doubt of the authenticity of this egg." From Mr. Wilmot I have heard also of two other eggs of this bird, — one laid in some Zoological Garden, and figured in Lefevre's ' Atlas des (Eufs des Oiseaux d'Europe,' the other brought from Egypt by a Scotch physician. I should add that M. Fa\der's account of the nidification is partly worded after that of Temminck (Man. d'Orn. i. p. 10)"^. [M. Moquin-Tandon has some verj' instructive notes on the nidification of this species in the ' Revue et Magasin de Zoologie ' for November 1857, p. 491.] §2. One. — Tangier, April 1845. From M.Eavier's Collection, 1847. O. W., tab. 1. fig. 3. This egg I bought, among some others, of Mr. Williams of Oxford Street. I saw M. FaAier's marks on nearly all of them, and I did not doubt they were all from him originally. From the writing upon it, it is evidently one of those I saw at Tangier. * A curious geological event happened in consequence of M. Fa\'ier's oological inclinations. A huge mass of sand-rock was pointed out to me, underneath which were said to lie the remains of four men who had been engaged in robbing a nest for him, when the mass gave way and rolled upon them. It had been under- mined for several years by the crumbling away of tlie clay on which it rested con- foi-mably ; and as it is the last feather that breaks the camel's back, so the weight of these four men determined the moment of the fall of the huge clitf. All tlie powers of Tangier could not get them from beneath it. 4 NEOPHRON PERCNOPTKRUS. § 3. T'^^o.— Tangier, 3 May, 1840. From M. Favier's Collec- tion, 1847. O. W. tab. 1. fig. 5. Received from M. Favier, 21st February, 1847. There cannot be much doubt now of the authenticity of these eggs. I saw one with M. Lefevre in Paris in 1846, and another at Geneva in the same year, both similar to these. The latter showed much of the ground- colour, i.e. the white shell. The best-marked of the two specimens under consideration is of a similar red, in the spots, to the other eggs. I have had, further, a satisfactory assurance from M. Favier that Aquila ncevia is not found on the Barbary coast. § 4. One. — Tangier. From M. Favier's Collection, 1847. o. w. tab. 1. fig. 1. I have had much doubt about this egg. Mr. Henry Milner says it is exactly like his Osprey's taken in Scotland; it is also very like Mr. Yarrell's egg of that bird. [This egg was bought of Mr. Williams with the one before-mentioned (§ 2). Mr. WoUey is certainly right in saying that it resembles an Osprey's : indeed, as far as I know, it might be taken for one ; but I can well understand, after having now seen so many, it being that of a Neophron ; and Ospreys' eggs must be less easy of access in North- West Africa than those of the Egj^tian Vulture.] § 5. One. — "Pyrenees, 1855." From M. Parzudaki's Collec- tion, 1856. Sent to me with other eggs by M. Parzudaki, 28 March, 1856. § 6. One. — Valley of the Medjerdah, near Souk Harras, Eastern Atlas, 25 April, 1857. From Mr. O. Salvin's Collection. 0. W. tab. 1. fig. 4. The Medjerdah is the river that flows out at Utica. This egg, Mr. Salvin states, was taken in the upper part of its valley by a Frenchman named Lafosse, a collector of minerals and such things. [Mr. Salvin's notes on the nidification of this species are published at length in ' The Ibis,' vol. i. p. 180.] NEOPHRON PERCNOPTERUS. 5 § 7. One. — Kef Laks, Eastern Atlas, 15 April, 1857. From Mr. 0. Salvin's Collection. The spot just mentioned is a sort of plateau, with rocks falling away all around : the cliff whence this egg was obtained faced the east. It was taken by an Arab near the camp. The nest contained one egg, which was very fresh. § 8. Two. — "Pyrenees." From M. Parzudaki's Collection, 1858. About the 25th February, 1858, I selected these two eggs, as ex- tremes in point of size, from a number brought by M. Parzudaki to London, — one being a very large and one a very smaU one, and yet, he says, undoubtedly of the same species. If 1 understood him rightly, they are from the Pyrenees, and not Algeria, and from the same tract as the Lammergeyer's I got at the same time. ^ 9. One. — Khifan M'sroutun, Eastern Atlas, 24 April, 1857. "W. H. S." From Mr. W. H. Simpson's Collection. There were three eggs in this nest. "Wherever the initials of my friend Mr. Simpson appear, they imply that the egg was taken by his own hand, or actually as he was looking on and identified the species. Hence this is a very interesting specimen, besides its being rather a variety. One day, while he was away from the tents, all his eggs got wetted; and most of the Vultures' were seriously injured, as they remained uulooked to for several days. § 10. One. — Gala el Hamara, Eastern Atlas, 25 April, 1857. From Mr. Tristram's Collection. O. W. tab. 1. fig. 6. From a nest of two fresh eggs. It formed Lot 11, at Mr. Stevens's rooms, 9th February, 1858. ^1. Two.—Kd M'slouta, Eastern Atlas, 2 May, 1857. From Mr. Tristram's Collection. These two specimens were from the same nest ; one is small and very curiously coloured. 6 VULTUR CINEREUS. GYPS FULVUS. § 12. One.—Kei Gh'tar, Eastern Atlas, 22 April, 1857. From Mr. Tristram's Collection. 0. W. tab. 1. fig. 2. Given to me at the same time as the preceding two^ in the autumn of 1858, by Mr. Tristram. [^ IS. One.— Yrom Lord Lilford's Collection, 1855. Bouglit at Vienna.] [§ 14. Two.— Medjerdah, Eastern Atlas, 6 May, 1857. From Mr. Tristram's Collection. A complete nest of two eggs, brought by M. Lafosse.] [§15. One.—Kei Laks, Eastern Atlas, 17 May, 1857. From Mr. O. Salvin's Collection. This egg is one that was collected by Ai'abs for Mr. Simpson, on his retiu-n from Ain Djendeli.] VULTUR CINEREUS, Gmelin. CINEREOUS VULTURE. § 16. One.—" Les basses Alpes, 1856." From M. Parzudaki's Collection, 1858. M. Parzudaki said this was from "les basses Alpes J" He did not tell me in whose writing the name on the egg was. GYPS FULVUS (Gmelin). ■ GRIFFON VULTURE. § 17. One. — Knowsley Menagerie, 14 March, 1849. Ilewitson, ' Eggs of British Birds,' Ed. 3. pi. i. This egg was presented to me on the loth March, 1849, by Mr. Thompson of Lord Derby's menagerie. It was laid the day before. 1 saw the Griffon Vultures with another Vulture, or Eagle, in the cage, and 1 was told the Griffon laid an egg (or two ?) last year, and another this year. She was preparing the nest. They were sup- posed to be barren eggs ; but why, I forget — whether both the Griffons GYPS FULVUS. 7 were females, or what ? I did not inquire whether the egg might not possibly be a hybrid; but no one suggested it was so. It was cracked when I first saw it at the keeper's house. It was quite fresh when I blew it, and the contents had a musky taste. Lady Cust has presented an egg of this bird to the Liverpool Museum, no doubt fi'om the same quarter. A few days before I went to Liverpool I had written to M. Auguste Lefevre, of Paris, to bespeak four eggs of the Griflbn Vulture. ^ 18. O/w.—From M. Lefevre's Collection, through Mr. H. F. Walter. § 19. T^/^o.— Pyrenees (?), 1856. From M. Parzudaki's Col- lection, 1856. Taken, as it seems, this year. M. Parzudaki told me how that the first season he offered large prices for a few, then there came more, till this year he had a great many. § 20. One.—Kei Gh'tar, Eastern Atlas, 14 April, 1857. From Mr. 0. Salvin's Collection. From a cliff facing the north at Kef Gh'tar, long. 5° 20' E. of Paris, lat. 36° 15' N., near Ras el Alia, marked in the map of the province of Constantine, published by the French Government in 1854. Mr. Salvin shot a bird near this rock, and states that this species hardly ever lays more than one egg, a single exception only occurring to his knowledge. The nests, some six hundred feet above the river, are about the middle of the perpendicular part of the cliff, and built of sticks. The birds sit hard, and soon come back to their nests. [Mr. Salvin's notes respecting the nesting of this species a republished in 'The Ibis,' vol. i. p. 178.] [§21. One. — Balkan Mountains (?). From Lord Lilford's Col- lection, 1855.] [§ 22. One. — Gala el Hamara, Eastern Atlas, 15 April, 1857. From Mr. W. H. Simpson's Collection. Brought from Algeria hy ^Ir. Simpson.] 8 GYPAETUS BARBATUS. — AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. [§ 23. One.—Kei M'satka, Eastern Atlas, 8 March, 1859. "P. L. S." From Dr. P. L. Sclater. One of the few egg-treasures obtained by Mr. Sclater during his short tiip to Algeria and Tunis in 1859. It was taken in his presence.] GYPAETUS BARBATUS (Linnaeus). BEARDED VULTURE. § 24. Tim. — " Pyrenees, 1857." From M. Parzudaki's Col- lection, 1858. Without inscription till I wrote on them, from a memorandum of what M. Parzudaki had told me concerning the eggs I received of liim. He particidarly said these were not from Algeria, but from the Pyrenees. AQUILA CHRYSAETUS (Linnaeus). GOLDEN EAGLE. The Mountain Eagle, as in Scotland it is generally called, still breeds in some of the more remote districts of our island, as well as of Ireland. Last year (1852) I knew of five nests that had eggs in them in different parts of Scotland ; and undoubtedly there were at least as many more of which I did not hear particulars. In the Orkneys there was for a numljcr of years an eyrie in the interior of one of the islands. In Shetland I have not been able to obtain any proof of the existence of this bird, and it is certainly unknown in the Fsero Islands and in Iceland. In Norway it is common, and, with the Sea Eagle, is so numerous that, from a statistical account of the premiums paid each year by the government for the destruction of beasts and birds of prey, as published in the 'Athenaeum,' No. 1367 [for Feb. 7, 1852 (p. 179)], it appears that, in the five years ending December 1850, there were paid for altogether no less than 10,715 Eagles ! The Sutherlandshire Expedition of Naturalists mention [Edinb. New Phil. Journ. XX. pp. 158, 159] the number of Eagles that had been paid for between March 1831 and March 1834 to have been 171, besides 53 nestlings or eggs ! Shortly after that time the Association for the destruction of vermin was dissolved, and the breed was kept down AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. 9 only by the indmdual exertions of the large sheep-farmers, who generally gave five shillings for each egg or young one, and ten shillings for every old bird ; and great satisfaction they had in dashing the former against the ground. Still so many remained, that in one district in the south-west of that county a clever gamekeeper trapped fifteen Eagles in three months of 1847, and about as many in the winter of 1850-1, almost all of them being Mountain Eagles. In other parts of Scotland more frequented by south-country game- keepers, they have been already almost exterminated, except in those wild tracts preserved as Deer forests, upon several of which the pro- prietors take real pleasure in seeing them circling overhead, ready to gorge themselves with the " gralloch '' as soon as a Stag has been cut up. For, whatever may have been said to the contrary, they are great carrion-eaters, as Scott well knew : — " That Higliland Eagle e'er should feed On thy fleet limbs, my matchless steed." [Lady of the Lake, Canto I. Stanza 9.] But the Trossachs is no feeding-place for the Eagle now, as it still was in Sir Walter's time ! Only a few years ago a friend of mine saw no less than nine of the two kinds collected round a dead horse, within gunshot of the window of his father's house. This habit of theirs gives sad facilities for their destruction. In Wales there were Eagles not long ago : but the only account I know of a nest in England which can with certainty be referred to the Golden Eagle is Willughby's of the one in Derbyshire [' Ornithologia ' (1676), p. 19] ; for the nest on the rocks near Plymouth [Mag. Nat. Hist. ser. 2. vol. i. p. 1 14] is more likely to have been a Sea Eagle's. I have in different years carefully examined some eight or nine distinct eyries of this bird in Scotland, and seen the old sites of a good many more. It always, in this day at least, takes up its quarters in some mountainous district, — never, as far as I have seen, in sea- cliffs, but for the most part in a warm-looking rock, well clothed -with vegetation, and by no means very wild and exposed. Still there are exceptions. I have seen several very high rocks selected ; and in these cases the nest was generally near the top. In one instance I know of a nest halfway up a very bleak mountain ; but then it is in the front part of a little cave, from which the occupants enjoy the most magni- ficent prospect. Into this nest one walks almost without climbing ; at all events, two dogs followed our party into it. They are often in places remarkably accessible. One nest, in a very low rock, was upon a grassy ledge, into and out of which I vaidted with the greatest ease 10 AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. from the top of the rock ; and three nests of other years, in different spots in the same ravine, within a hundred yards or so, were all accessible without ropes. Another, which was described to me by a most accurate person, who offered to show it to me, was on the ground, at the foot of a rock on the rise of a hill ; and near it, also upon the ground, was an old nest of a former year. This was some hundreds of miles away from the pair of Golden Eagles in Orkney, which one year allowed an old woman to walk by chance into their nest and carry off the eggs in her apron. At another eyrie, into which I had climbed with some difficulty, I was enabled to find a very easy path out, by following the ledge where I saw that some sheep had been not long- before. The eyrie from which I took the pair of eggs figured by Mr. Hewitson [Eggs B. B. ed. 3. pi. iii.] was in a bad part of a great and perpendicular crag, under a very sharp shelf beyond a ledge, whence we could use the ropes. Its support was small, and the mass of the nest was consequently large. A few yards from it, on either side, were old nests of former years, one of which had been recently repaired, and was connected with the occupied one by a continuous platform of sticks. One eyrie is generally in a corner protected from the wind on one side ; and the rock overhangs more or less, so as to shelter it, but by no means so as to hide it from a gun above. The platform of rock is often very broad ; and when it is also flat, there are not many sticks used. It has for the most part some kind of vegetation upon it, and generally more or less of the broad-leaved grass called Luzula sylvatica, which, with other plants, often extends in a green stripe a long way below the nest, owing to the richness of the soil, — a mark by which an experienced eye can, from a great distance, detect an old eyrie on a mountain, some years after it has been disused. There is sometimes a sapling tree at the edge of the platform in front ; and in the Derbyshire nest [described by Willughby] it was no doubt the lower part of the bole that helped the rock to support the fabric. A nest is generally five or six feet in its greatest width, considerably less at the top : sometimes the mass of materials would fill a cart, but in other situations there is no great quantity. The very largest of the sticks used may be an inch in diameter, but most of them are less. Upon these is laid freshly-gathered heather ; and in one instance large sprigs of Scotch fir, broken off for the purpose. The top part is composed of fern, grass, moss, or any other convenient material, but principally (and, as far as I have seen, in- variably) of tufts of Luzula sylvatica, which, by the time the eggs are hatched, are still fresh and green towards the outside of the nest, but dried up in the centre with the heat of the bird's body, [so as to look] AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. 11 like little flattened pine -apple tops. Once I saw this in a great measure replaced by tufts of a kind of Carex or Nardus. The hollow of the nest is never deep ; but whilst the eggs are unhatched it is often pretty regular and sharp at the inner edge, and it is not more than a foot from the back wall of rock, close to which the soft materials are generally packed. There is little interlacing of the materials ; but the whole structure, whilst it appears loose, is yet so firm that it scarcely springs at all with the weight of a man. The nest is repaired each year ; and I have no doubt, from Wil- lughby's description, that the one found in Derbyshire had been used more than once. But it is usual for the same pair of Eagles to have several favourite sites in different quarters ; and they frequently repair them all before making a final choice of the one in which to lay their eggs. What determines them it is difficult to say. One forester thinks it is the way the wind blows when they are ready to lay ; another, that the sight of a human being scares them. A third possible and very singular cause has once occurred in my own experience : it is the generation, in the lining of the nest of a preceding year, of myriads of fleas, exactly like those that trouble mankind. I do not know whether a fourth reason for giving up a favourite place may not occasionally be a forcible ejectment by even a less power than man. I have seen in a simple rock an old eyrie, which had been subsequently occupied as a nursery by a Marten ; but I think there must have been a previous desertion in such a case. Still a few of the best places are inhabited uninterruptedly. I have seen one which it was said had never been empty for fifteen successive years until four years ago ; but it was again used in 1852. Some old shepherds have told me that they and their fathers had seen two eyries relieve each other every two years or thereabouts. The same birds wiU select very different situa- tions. I am told of a pair that alternate between a crag quite im- pregnable and a corner into which a child can climb. In these days an altogether new place is rarely thought of. It is quite sufficient to visit the four or five known stations in a district, in one of which the Eagle will be found. Long experience had made many Highlanders believe that the supply of Eagles was inexhaustible ; for if one of a pair was killed, the survivor was sure to bring a fresh mate the next year ; but most of these persons have by this time found out their mistake. The eggs are laid very early in the year, often with the country under deep snow. The hen sits very close ; and, accordingly, that is the sex which is most frequently murdered at this season ; but if any- thing happens to her, the cock will take her place for a time, but not so as to succeed in rearing the young, for he too is often slain in his 12 AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. turn. The very clean condition in which the eggs are mostly found, even when just hatcliing, shows that she can scarcely have left the nest since they were laid ; and yet it is not till there are young ones that much food is seen lying about. So closely does she sit when " closking/^ that it is only the sight of a man's eye, or a bit of stick or stone about her ears, that will make her fly off; but when she does so, it is generally in considerable alarm, and perhaps with a low cry, taking care to appear no more till her enemies have retired. I have heard of an old man, and another time of a woman, being attacked by the birds near a nest ; and a person told me that once, Avhen quite alone, and in some difficulty on a very ticklish rock, the Eagles tried to knock him off with their wings. Such a thing never occurred to myself; and from conversations with persons who have been at scores of nests in former days, I am disposed to believe it is a rare event. When the eggs are taken, I have never heard of a second laying that year. More than one supposed instance of their being removed to another spot, in the claws of the parents, has come under my notice ; but the propensities of Hooded Crows, and other sources of error, make me hesitate to consider these accounts as proved. There are from one to three eggs in a nest ; I do not know of an instance of four ; but two is the usual and proper number. Last year I had three eggs, all fertile and nearly ready to hatch, out of one nest ; and Mr. Salmon mentions that he knew of three young ones in a nest in Orkney [Mag. Nat. Hist. ser. 1. vol. v. p. 423]. In all other cases where I have heard of three eggs, one was addled ; and it was thus in a nest where I found two young ones with a rotten egg. This was white, whilst one at least of its fellows had been highly coloured ; but pure- white eggs are not always bad, as I know for certain in two instances. One infatuated Eagle I found sitting on a solitary egg, which, though addled, had some colour on it. The eggs are laid at intervals of a few days, and are hatched in the same order. In two pairs, I know which of the eggs was hatching first. Of the pair figured by Mr. Hewitson [Eggs B. B. ed. 3. pi. iii.], the one represented by the uppermost figure had already been chipped, whilst the other had not nearly arrived at the same condition. In another pair, an egg, crowded with faint freckles, was hatched certainly several days before its companion, a purely white one, would have been. There is often a remarkable difference, and yet a family likeness, in twin eggs. Again, in an undisturbed eyrie, where you find pale eggs one year, you may expect to find them still pale the next. The healthy triplet I have above spoken of were all very pale, and they came out of the nest which had the white and the freckled egg the year before. AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. 13 The eggs of this Eagle vary exceedingly ; those in the plate I have just referred to are the highest-coloured ones I have seen^ but are very useful as showing the heau ideal at which a considerable number appear to be aiming, and it requires only a very little stretch of the imagination to resolve them into their varieties. The markings, still preserving the intensity of those of the upper figure, are frequently more evenly distributed over the egg, in spots of greater or of less dimensions, sometimes thickly scattered, and sometimes very remote from each other. In some eggs there is a beautiful arrangement of the colouring matter into closely croAvded streams or drops, which reminds one of the " golden rain '^ of a firework, — a variety also to be seen in eggs of the Buzzard and Sparrow Hawk. In others the spots are very minute and of a reddish-purple hue, gradually collecting together, and slightly increasing in size, till they almost coalesce in the centre of the large end. Again, the egg is thickly dusted all over with one colour — a yellowish-brown — in several degrees of intensity, and in this form is very like eggs of the Iceland Falcon. One wholly- coloured egg of Mr. Walter's reminds me of the more even and uni- form specimens of the Peregrine Falcon and Merlin. Of eggs with the markings all very faint, and as it were foreshadowings of those on the varieties to which I have alluded, I have seen a good many ex- amples ; but it must not be supposed that highly-marked eggs are uncommon. I am convinced, from a considerable and quite unse- lected number of Golden Eagles' eggs which I have seen, that well- marked specimens are the rule, not the exception. The egg which I should be disposed to choose as most typical is such a one as that figured by Mr. Hewitson [Eggs B. B. ed. 3. pi. iv. fig. 1] . There is a purple or lilac cast about it, and the markings are agreeably shaded and blended together. I have repeatedly seen eggs more or less like it, and it has a character in common with the beautiful example for- merly represented by him [Eggs B. B. ed. 1. pi. ii. fig. 1]. The one taken out of the same nest with it has as much colour, but of quite a different kind, being somewhat of the Iceland Falcon type. The tendency of markings to the large instead of to the small end is to be found in the eggs of many kinds of birds ; but it is so frequent in Golden Eagles' as hardly to deserve to be called a variety in this respect. A remarkable egg in Mr. Wilmot's cabinet has very fine dots, one or two small blotches, and some long straggling lines of the same colour near the larger end. In short, eggs of the Golden Eagle may be found representing those of all our other birds of prey in suc- cession, even including the Egyptian Vulture. In shape, the egg of this species varies in different specimens ; but 14 AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. the lower figure of the pair represented by Mr. Hewitson [Eggs B. B. ed. 3. pi. iii. fig. 2] is most typical. This same egg is perhaps of about the average size. I have two very large ones, out of one nest ; they are of a long- elliptical form ; one is 3"26 inches by 2"38 inches, the other is 3" 13 inches by 2*38 inches. The latter is of the purest white, the former like a well-coloured Iceland Falcon's. The eggs are hatched in Scotland about the end of April. In three nests I have found young ones just coming out on the 23rd April, the 27th April, and the 1st or 2nd May. These are provided by nature with a little white " diamond '' on the convex part of the beak to enable them to break the shell. They remain chirping inside for some time after they have made a little window to get a taste of fresh air ; and in the meantime the long threads with which they are covered begin to dry, and to burst their thin delicate envelopes, that they may be converted into a forest of snow-white down. It is a curious sight to see in the middle of a huge nest these little powder- puffs holding up their tottering heads, overgrown and watery-eyed, to peck feebly at an intruder. Here I will leave them, only whispering of their capital larder, which the Irishman and (in the case of another species^) the African have each in their OAvn country learned to share. The Scotchman did so too, till one day, finding a dead "serpent" ready for him, his indignation got the better of his prudence, and he knocked the " uncanny beasties " on the head. I must, however, add that Reynard also will put in his claim ; and that he may not have to travel too far for his supper, he will probably make his earth in the immediate neighbourhood. But still one word more. Is it not worth an effort to save the last remnant of this noble race — the bird which so many of the greatest nations of the earth, both ancient and modern, have taken as their emblem — the very highest type of SAviftness, of energy, and of power ? How many people of England, France, or Switzerland itself, ever saw an Eagle on the wing ? and how many have longed in vain for such an incident even in the heart of the Highlands ! Of the Scotch themselves, how many would now know an Eagle's quill from a Turkey's if they saw it in a chieftain's bonnet, and in a land where its feathers were once scarcely less prized than they still are by the Indians of the Fur-Countries ? Fitzjames's cap was trimmed with Heron plumage; and it was the Falcon that watched the chase from her cairn ; but Avhat a number of ideas the Eagle supplies in Scott's glorious poem, and in all truly * [Aquila hcUicosa, Daudin. Lc Griffard, Levaillant, Ois. d'Afr. i. tab. 1. Aqttila urjnigera, Remiie, 'Field Naturalist/ vol. i. (18.33), p. 44. — Ed.] AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. 15 Highland stories ! Is not the vahie of a few lambs and fawns a cheap price to pay for its preservation ? for it is only here and there that an Eagle is not contented with Hares^ and sometimes a Grouse or a Ptarmigan : just as with Foxes, it is but a few individuals that bring the bad name on all their race. But if it be too late, as I fear it is, to hope for the Eagle's prolonged existence in Scotland, now that the railways tie London to the Grampians, and the salmon- fisher, the grouse-shooter, and the skin-collector, as well as the sheep- farmer, all give great rewards for its destruction, we may still go to see it in foreign lands, and we must try to console ourselves with the utilitarian reflection that the number of destructive animals in a country is the measure of that country's civilization ! ^ § 25. T'z^-o.— Siitherlandshire, 24 April, 1848. Erom Mr. W. Dunbar's Collection. Of these beautiful and highly-marked eggs, Mr. Dunbar says in his letter dated 21st June, 1848, " The Golden Eagle's eggs are both from the same nest. The eggs were two in number. The nest was placed in a rock about two hundred feet high, in Sutherland. The nest was about eighty feet from the bottom of the rock, and com- posed of large sticks and stumps of strong heather, with moss. The old bird, a female, was shot ; I have her now preserved, and she is a very fine specimen." The following year I heard that the nest in which these eggs were was easily accessible, on the east side of the mountain. Further particulars respecting the locality whence these eggs came are given by Mr. Scrope in his ' Art of Deer-stalking,' p. 365. ^ [The foregoing paragi-aphs were -RTitten by Mr. "Wolley in the spring of 1853, for the use of Mr. Hewitson, who was then preparing the third edition of his well- known ' Eggs of British Birds.' A slightly modified version of them was accord- ingly communicated to that gentleman, and he has given copious extracts from it {op. cit. pp. 10-13). I have here introduced the notes from the original manu- script now in my possession. Some verbal discrepancies are consequently ob- servable between the two accounts ; but these are so unimportant that I do not think it necessary to reprint the passage from Mr. Flewitsou's pages, though he has most kindly given me permission to quote in this book all the information furnished to his last edition by Mr. Wolley, — a favom* of which I shall not be slow to avail myself in most cases. It must be remembered that these notes contain the general results of their author's experience only up to the time above-mentioned. A more extended knowledge of the habits of the Golden Eagle, especially as regards its nidification in trees, in some points altered Mr. WoUey's opinion ; and a case of fmir eggs being found in a nest has been recorded by Capt. Orde (Ibis, 1861, p. 112.— Ed.] 16 AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. § 26. 7>^o.— Sutherlandshire, 27 April, 1849. "J. W. ipse." Hewitson, * Eggs of British Birds,' Ed. 3. pi. iii, figs. 1, 2. We started from the inn with two men carrying the sixty-fathom ropes which I had had made in the town. We rested at a place where the foreman was anxious to get rid of Eagles, and sent for the shep- herd, at whose house we had been the day before, and avIio was to fol- low us. We heard many different accounts — how that the foxhunter killed one Eagle a few weeks ago, &c. Some were willing to mislead us, others not so, but all agreed that the nest was inaccessible. We reached the crag after a walk of some eight or nine miles from the village. It is a very high cliff, overhanging a large loch of the same name, A small birch wood slopes from it to the water. We saw an Eagle fly, and settle again at the top of the cliff. Arrived at the shepherd's house, he agreed to come with us, and his son was to show us the nest; but afterwards the old fellow turned coward and would not come near tlie edge. Having returned under guidance of the shepherd's son to where we saw the Eagle, I made out the nest with the help of my glass, but 1 could not point it out exactly to my companion. However, he was to remain below with the boy, to signal to me where it was. Having reached the top in about half an hour, 1 tied myself to the thick rope, and proceeded, gun in hand, over a ledge to an undercliff of from ten to twenty feet wide, along which I walked some forty or fifty yards. 1 leaned over the edge, and saw the sticks of the nest some little distance to my right. 1 got up, shouted and made all the noise 1 could ; but no Eagle came out. 1 saw one soaring silently at a great height, I had been led to believe that there was only one bird belonging to the nest ; so, after all the noise 1 had made, 1 took it for granted that this was the one. I shouted for the bttle rope, and tied a stone and a piece of white paper to it, for my companion to signal when it was opposite the nest. However, 1 found afterwards that he could not distinguish it. 1 could only just make him out to be waving his cap, he was so far below. No sooner was the stone over the edge of the rock than out dashed an Eagle close to me, T\dthin five yards, and with one low cry of alarm flew away to the right, down the valley. Evidently a Mountain Eagle, as the shepherds had all called it (it looked rather "ring-tailed") : 1 was not altogether sorry at having laid aside my gun. All was now finally planned. The men wisely thought it would be better to have the stake driven and everything done upon the ledge. The shepherd, being an old man, did not dare come down. After a AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. 17 little difficulty (for there was no depth of soil), we fixed the big stake firmly above a very steep slope, some yards from the edge of tlie rock ; then a stake for the little rope twenty yards to the left of us. Having spliced the rope to the stake upon which I was to sit, and tied myself in, explained all to the men, and agreed upon the signals, I proceeded over the edge, which, to my horror, I found almost as sharp as a knife, being a kind of mica-schist. I now felt how stupid I had been in forgetting to bring the leathern tubes I had had made; for the sharp edge, besides wearing the rope, caused great friction and difficulty in hauling up. No sooner was I over the rock, with the little rope in my right hand, than I saw the nest, with two eggs, beautiful, and very diiferent from each other, about five feet to my left as I faced the rock. I could just reach the ledge with my fingers and unshod toes, and so, having cried " Stop," I hung, with the rope bearing me backwards towards the abyss, in a position both cramping from the muscular exertion required, and highly nervo-excitory from the feeling of danger or insecurity, unfounded though it might have been. On looking at the eggs in the nest I at once saw a hole in one, as if the old bird had dug her claw into it in her hurry ; but on further examination I found it had a young one in it just hatching, and giving vent to low cries, which accounted for the high state of " closking " in which I had found the mother. I reached the eggs and put them in the box with tow, which I liad lashed under my right arm, and I put some of the lining of the nest in my pocket. It was very large, something like a Rook's highly magnified, and lined ^vith a kind of Luzula, much of it quite green, and apparently recently placed around: the middle was dried up*. About six feet to my left, and with the embankment of sticks continued to it, was another platform, with fresh stuff on it — perhaps a nest of last year, or a roosting- place for the other bird. Ten or twelve yards to the right, and not exactly on the same ledge, was another old nest. A few white feathers (Ptarmigans') and white fur (Mountain Hares') were all the remnants of prey that I saw. I was able to commu- nicate with the men by shouting, as I was not more than six feet from the top of the rock, and one of them had descended to the edge. It was fortunate ; for had there been wind, as in the morning, I could not have been heard ; nor, as it was, could I have been heard further down. The little-rope signals had entirely failed. The eggs * This Luzula, which I believe to be L. sijlratica, grows plentifully on the damp mountain-sides and ledges of rocks. The Eagles pluck and use the whole plant, whicli is something like the top of a pine-apple ; and when dry, the leaves remind one of Russian matting ; but they are not long as in specimens gathered in woods. c 18 AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. having been carefully tied up, I shouted to ascend. The first pull, they told me, was very hard j but I assisted them by climbing myself, and in half a minute I was high and dry, and we shook hands all round : we had finished our " wee drop '' of whiskey before. During this time the Eagle did not appear, though it had again come within two or three hundi'ed yards before I went down, but without scream- ing. All agreed that no man had ever been there before. My com- panion and the boy, tired and cold, reached the top of the cliff just in time to congratulate us on our success. In going home I put the eggs alternately in my breeches^ pocket to keep them warm, for I was anxious to save the life of the young. In the evening I liberated the hatching one by an oval opening, and the egg is as good as ever. This is the one with the fewest marks upon it : and it must have been laid and sat upon several days before the other ; for when I opened that in the same manner, part of the yelk was not yet absorbed. I put the young bird from the first egg before the fire ; its down soon dried, and it became like a powder-puff: I kept it as warm as possi- ble, but it died in two days : perhaps I tried to feed it too soon ; or it might have been neglected while I was out. The other one I put in spirits. The dovm on the legs, as far as the di^^sion of the toes, proved them to be Golden Eagles. The eyes were not open. The " diamond " on the beak, as in other young birds, used for making the hole in the egg, Avas very conspicuous. P.S. 6th April, 1852.— Mr. H. F. W*^^^* has this day, for the second time, made me a bond fide offer of twenty pounds for this pair of eggs. ^ 27. One, with the half of another. — Siitherlandshire, 4 May, 1849. "J.W.ipse." O. W. tab. iv. fig. 1. On 1st May, 1849, 1 looked in vain for an Eagle's nest, though the birds were said to be daily seen about. I caused huge stones to be pitched down every hundred yards or so. In past years a pair had built in at least four different spots about. A man had climbed to three of the places this year and found none in use. He gave one egg to a gentleman, probably the late INIr. Charles St. John, when he called at his housed The rocks are wooded like the range of the High Tor in Derbyshire. Next day, after harrying a White- 1 [The following year INIr. Wolley heard that this nest, for which he had sought so much, had been found, a few days after he left the gi'ound, with a young bird, which the finder killed in the nest, shooting the hen Eagle also ! — Ed.] AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. 19 tailed Eagle's nest, we proceeded to \dsit a noted breeding-place of the Golden Eagle. Here the young ones were destroyed last year by the shepherd's fox-hunting party ; but no one had succeeded in climbing into the nest. As we approached, we saw no cock bird to encourage us ; but several Eagle's feathers were lying about. I saw a nest which was only twenty or thirty feet from a point easily access- ible. Having reached it, I threw stones ; but no bird appeared. I climbed up Avith considerable difficulty into the nest round an angle of the rock, where T could hardly worm my Avay, and then only by digging my fingers into the matted rhizomes of PoJypodium vulgare, without which I must have fallen over. In the nest, which appeared to be that of last year, I found a foot of a Red Deer fa^vn. Resting on my hands and knees, I felt, as I thought, a lot of flies crawling on my hands. On closer inspection I saw they were fleas, and my arms and legs were swarming with them. I beat a retreat ; but the point that was before so difficult was far worse in going back. 1 lay down, my feet first, and got round safe, though the rock pushed me out so much that the weight of a bullet would have overbalanced me. One of my men standing on a ledge below helped me down the last part. Then for the fleas ! With the help of flint and steel a fire was made with moss and heather, and I stripped to the skin. Luckily the day was as hot as could be, and it was very pleasant with a plaid coat over my shoulders. 1 afforded much merriment to my men and to myself, telling them I was in the dress of the Highlanders before the kilt was invented. After an hour or two's hard picking and smoking, the clothes were handed over to me, one by one, as 1 sat at some distance, and I extracted a few score more, but still put many around me"^. This nest was in a situation similar to the others — a platform in a corner, with rock overhanging ; but I was too much frightened at the fleas to make the leisurely examination I had intended. 1 saw a curious rock-plant, that I did not observe elsewhere, in two places here ; it had a large pink flower. Having cautiously extinguished the fire, Ave made for the corrie, where the Eagle was said always to build. We presently saw one sail- ing from round the far corner ; but he took to circling, and appeared to be hunting, as he gradually went out of sight. We telescoped the rock * Lady Franklin afterwards told me of a notorious nest of fleas in a bell-tower, I think, at Constantinople, into which she went in spite of warning. I have heard of a similar swarm having been met with amongst the shavings in a new house at Rome ; and an adventure of my own among the loose leaves under the iig-tree at Tangier is a fourth instance. c 2 20 AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. in vain. The men were sent to tlie top to pitch stones down ; and a fearful sight it was to see the huge masses bomiding and whizzing through the air. My dog " Jock " and I then went under the rock to look for traces^ and in one place we saw bones and sticks as if from the nest ; but on looking up I coidd not see it, though I thought it must have been there. We saw Deer, one of which stood at not more than fifty yards. I went on as far as a second loch, round the corner from which two Ravens came to meet me. On firing a shot a female Peregrine left her nest, the male having appeared before. We saw more Deer and a Ptarmigan. Then there was a huge fall of rock, and an alarm of a stone overhead. On returning past the corrie we saw an Eagle again, but after one turn along the face of the rocks it sailed away. We left the ropes in the corrie, so as to make a further search the next morning, and got home about ten to an excellent supper and a noble peat-fire at the lodge. The follow- ing day the forester went with us to the corrie ; I observed that our guide kept us a long way from the rocks, and he suggested that our ropes should be left on the other side of the valley, where we were to pass the next day. With the aid of a glass he pointed out the sites of two old nests. On the morrow (4th May) , we started. The heat was tremendous. The men made straight for the ropes, while I kept to the left and more sheltered side of the valley, intending to re-examine the Eagle-rocks in this corrie. I fired a shot, when an Eagle showed high overhead. I called to the men across the valley ; and when they, poor fellows, arrived, we went back to the old place where the two nests had been seen. Climbing up to the right of the nest as I faced the rock, I saw that it was new ; but to my vexation I heard the same little squeaks from the egg as on a former occasion (§ 26), showing that the young were hatched. I could not see into the nest ; and it not appearing easy of access from that quarter, I went to the other side, where, after throwing down two or three loose bits so as to make a footing round a narrow corner, all was plain sailing. "The nest is five or six feet across by three or four broad from the angle. The cup or hollow of the nest is a foot from the angle. Foundation made of sticks, of which the largest may be one inch in diameter : top made of heather, of which some is green. Lined with Luzula, fern, grass, and moss, chiefly the former : rhizome of it is rather like palmetto. The same stuff' is growing all over the shelf, which may be, including the slope to the tree (which is five or six feet below the nest), about nine feet square, or, rather, lozenge-shaped. A shelf at the height of ten feet overhangs to the tree by the plumb. Tn the nest is a white egg, Avith half the shell of another (which last AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. 21 is highly coloured) round it^ and two young birds in the same state mine was when it died {i.e. the one mentioned in § 26) : the eyes have a dull watery look : one generally with eyes closed. They peck feebly at my fingers. I read the above to G * * ^, who is with me in the nest. He assents to it all : ' it could not be correcter.' The platform of the nest itself {i.e. of the top part) is about the width of the cup every way, except towards the rock, where it is rather less ; about two feet high outside ; the lining may be nine inches in per- pendicular depth. The nest is, according to various computations, from fourteen to sixteen feet from the slope of the hill below. The old birds never show whilst we are at the nest. I blow the egg in the nest. It is addled ; a sort of sour smell ; all liquid inside, and no appearance of chick. I pack the broken shell by placing it on the sound one as I found it in the nest. I do not wash, or, at least, rub, the addled egg, which is a little soiled, but with one or two specks of true colour.^' This egg is very like one Mr. Hancock has, as he himself re- marked. The two young ones, covered with white down, had large livid feet, with soft, oddly-shaped claws ; their legs are downy to the very division of the toes, proving them to be Golden Eagles. They cost me a great deal of trouble, even in the middle of the night following, when I got up occasionally to keep up the peat-fire. They ate Golden Plover that night — the first time, probably, they had tasted anything. The next day they were so nearly dead of cold, that I had to make a fire for them on the moors. They throve and grew till an unlucky journey, during which I either overfed them or they were shaken too much : they became ill, and died, after a lingering ill- ness, between the 20th and 30th of May. They were then much grown, but with nothing on but white down. I preserved parts in spirit. § 28. 0/?^.— Argyllshire, 24 April, 1851. "J. W. ipse.'' O. W. tab. iv. tig. 2. On the morning of 24th April, Mr. Edge and I started, having a horse with the ropes round his neck, and a young man to take care of him. We picked up three other men as we went along. This was about seven or eight miles fi'om our inn ; and we left the horse and young man. We walked on a mile or two under a hot sun, till we turned into a corrie on the right. Here we saw an Eagle taking a long swooping flight directly down into a hollow out of sight, without moving its wings, which were brought to a point. Presently we crossed over the entrance of this den, and proceeded silently up the 22 AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. other side. When we got a little beyond where the nest was, we looked over, and there lay the hen Eagle on the nest. We watched her for an instant or two as she sat, with the axis of her body parallel with that of the den, her head towards us — that is, towards the closed end of the den. She stretched her neck a little on one side, saw us, and slowly flew off, sailing or flapping smoothly across the hollow, till at some distance she turned a corner, and, though we Tvept a good look-out, we did not see her again. We were about twenty yards from her when she was on her nest, and I had time to look at her copper-coloured head and neck, her hazel eye and yellow cere, &c., before she moved ; and when she was on the wing, I had a good sight of her spread marbled tail. A fine object she was ! On looking at the nest we were disappointed to see only a single egg in it, which did not look a very good one. The rope being tied round me, and a trusty man being next the rock, I descended quite easily by three stages or platforms into the nest, which might be twelve yards from the top, or even less. On one of these was an old nest. All the flats Avere covered with Luzula. The nest was made principally of heather ; but there were in it some branches of birch, newly gathered from the tree, apparently Avithin a day or two. The lining was almost entirely leaves of Luzula. The hollow, which was well formed, might be two spans in width, and was about one span from the rock, which did not overhang much. In front of the nest was a small Rowan-tree, growing at the edge of the platform. Some time later in the day I climbed almost into the nest from my right hand below, and from my left hand I climbed to the platform above the nest, tlms ascertaining that in two directions it might be reached without ropes. I went to the place from which the forester who was with me shot an Eagle some time ago, and last year shot another, which I saw stuffed at his house, from the same spot, getting so close to it that he could have touched it with the muzzle of his gun. He then saw the whole of its body except the head, and sent some one round to clap his hands and frighten it off; but it did not go until after several such noises were made, and it fell some way on the other side of the burn. On another occasion, when a bird was shot at and missed from the same spot, it darted confusedly into the depths below. It was in a wonderfully easy place, six feet from the level at the top of the rock — so easy, that there is almost a highway into it from the left above, and from the right a drop of less than a fathom. It was on a ledge, say four or five feet Avide, and flat. I went in at the left and came out at the right. There were two birch-trees and a rowan about it — one of the birches in front of the platform. The nest was of the usual construe- AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. 23 tion, principally heather, untouched this year. Another nest, between this and the inhabited one^ was very easy to climb into. I went quite into it, and found a couple of young raspberries growing a foot or two high out of the middle of the old heather-stalks ; it could not have been used for several years. The rock behind it was overplumb to a considerable height, and the nest was placed in an angle. All the nests were on the side of the den facing the east, which happened to be the steepest. The one egg was pinkish in colour and slightly soiled. On blowing- it the same evening, we found that it was addled, though so little stale that it could not have been laid a very long time. It floated in water with a small part above the surface. In attempting to account for its condition we were much puzzled. It had been seen nearly a week before ; and several days before that, it was not laid. § 29. 0//^.— Scottish Highlands, 1849. From Mr. L. Dunbar's Collection. This finely-marked egg was taken by a shepherd, and came into my possession 4th May, 1851, in its present mutilated state. 10th February, 1856. I have this day finished mending the above- mentioned egg, strengthening it with many strips of strong yet thin paper secured by the best gum-arabic ; also with a brace made of a Hooper's-pen quill laid across inside. It had previously been very rudely mended with poor paper laid on apparently with paste, for insects had eaten it. [This egg, in its present condition, is a model of Mr. Wolley's care and skill in treating a valuable specimen. About two-thnds of it remain ; but as this includes a complete " show sm-face," it has eveiy appearance of being quite perfect as it lies in the drawer.] § 30. T'mjo.— Sutherlandshire, 17 April, 1852. 0. W. tab. ii. fig. 3. These two beautiful eggs reached me in London on the day on which, three years before, I took the exquisite pair [§ 20] since figured by ]VIr. Hewitson. They were packed with wool and oat-chafi" in a small box with lid and bottom too thin; so that one of them got cracked on its journey. The insides were quite moist when I examined them, as though the eggs were just blown. They were very clean both inside and out ; and I had particularly desired my correspondent not to wash them outside. The cracked one, in the process of mending, I have been obliged to touch a little with water. I found tlie colour (which was slightly " smudged ") comes ofl' very easily. The other egg 24 AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. I have very lightly touched in one or two places where it was soiled with handling. The eggs and the wool in which they were packed have the peat-smoke smell of the inside of a Highland cottage^ with its happy recollections : through this smell I fancied I could perceive the scent of the Eagle's nest. The following parti culars^ many of which are of considerable interest, were received subsequently from my correspondent : — "3 May, 1852. ■^ ^ I got the eggs the third day before the date of my [former] letter, being April 17th. They were quite fresh. I should think they had only been sat upon three or four days. The nest was on the side facing the water, being, I suppose, the north-north-east, in a rather rugged rock. I could get within three yards of it without a rope, and I think, if I were ever trying it again, I would go without any rope at all. The rock is about fifteen or twenty fathoms in height, and nearly two- thirds of it under the nest [i. e. the nest was thirty or forty feet from the top. — J. W.] . There is no overhanging in the rock. The nest was very large, with some sticks as tliick as my arm, lined with heather and wool, with no tree in front. The Eagles have been known to build there for a number of years back in the same spot, and harried almost every year. The first day I tried it I did not see the bird on the nest ; nor did I know she was there, till she flew over my head, as large as life. On my return the second day, I could not see her head. I shouted, but she would not rise until I threw a stone. I made an attempt to get the eggs ; but as there was no one with me, I had not nerve enough to push on. Then on the third day I started with a young friend with gun and ropes. I shot the Eagle, and then got the eggs by his holding the rope. I could not see the bird from the bottom of the rock, and the head only could be seen from the top. I shot her from below ; she flew out of the nest rather hurriedly. She only gave one scream when she felt the smart of the shot, flew about a hundred yards, and fell quite dead. I did not see the cock bird the last day. I did not see any Hares near the nest, nor are there any Ptarmigan on the hill. There was a Raven's nest quite close by the Eagle's. I did not hear of any Fox being on the ground. You regret, I have no doubt, that I shot the Eagle ; but there will be a nest there next season. I never knew (nor did I hear) of an Eagle wanting a mate above a month at furthest." § 31. ^i^^o.— ArgyUshire, 20 April, 1852. O. W. tab. F. These two very fine eggs reached me at Paddington, 11th June, 1852. The spotted one is of extraordinary size. It has perhaps lost AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. 25 some of its colouring-matter ou the side on which it is blown, from the wiping which would be necessary during and after that operation. I have not touched it with water since it arrived. In giving my corre- spondent a drill last year, I had told him to take care not to wash the eggs. The white one appeared not to have been cleansed at all, as. there was a good deal of dirt upon it, which I thought it desirable to remove. I did so with pure water and a cambric handkerchief, touch- ing it very lightly. After this washing, it shows, I think, traces of fine spots and lines, especially towards the larger end. It was not at all stained or deeply grained with dirt, all this being superficial. Comparing it with five other white Eagle's eggs now before me, I cannot hesitate to attribute some faint yeUow specks to true mark- ing ; and this is rendered more evident by comparing it with its fellow, the very first stage of whose thick sprinkling the white egg may well be taken to represent. The coloured egg, which strongly reminds one of eggs of the Gyrfalcon, is not unlike one in Mr. Henry Wal- ter's cabinet ; it also belongs to the same class of eggs as the one Mr. Falconer has, laid in confinement, and the fragments which I ob- tained with a white one last year (1851) [§ 32]. My correspondent's letters of 9th and 22nd June contain the following particulars about these eggs : — " I took the Golden Eagle's eggs from a rock on the 20th April." " The bird flew off, the same as the one at the corrie last year did [§ 28], but a little quicker, and afterwards came round once above our heads, and then we lost sight of her. I could have shot her flying off the nest, but this I did not intend to do. I saw her sitting on her nest from the south side of the rock. I sent one of my men down on the rope from above to the nest, which was from twenty to thirty feet from where we hold the rope ; and down from the nest to the bottom of the rock is about a hundred and fifty yards. The nest was made of different kinds of small sticks and that broad grass you have seen [Luzula sylvatica]. There was no game in the nest, but there were some pieces of Hares and some feathers scattered about the top of the rock. The birds were formed in the eggs, but the bones were not thicker than pins." On 10th April, 1851, the site of this nest, among several others, was pointed out to me. It was on a very high rock ; but my informant said that a man could climb from above so near it as to push the young ones out with a long pole, as he himself had seen done. He had also let a man down with a rope. There was a nest there fifteen years in succession, but not for the last two years, though, on look- ing with his glass, he said there were fresh sticks, as he could see the green branches, altogether a cart-load, and, at the distance we were. 26 AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. the mass through a glass looked very great. It was necessary to go a long way up the valley before we got to a spot sufficiently near to enable us to distinguish it well. There were no eggs in it then, as a forester reported to us after an examination he had been directed to make^ § 32. One, with fragments of another. — Argyllshire, 23 April, 1851. "J. W. ipse," Mr. Edge and 1 left our quarters with our guide in a light cart, provided with ropes, &c. Opposite a certain corrie we met the forester, who had no good news for us, as the Eagle had deserted her nest [§ 31] in the rock at the end of it. He went on with us some way further, when we sent him forward to fetch the head forester, on whose ground was the other nest we intended to visit. We also sent our cart back with the driver, and walked on with our guide directly towards the point which had been shown to him as the locality for the principal object of our search. After crossing the river with some difficulty, we reached a spot opposite to the nest, and rested there. The place looked like a small pigeon-hole, in the face of the barest and boldest mountain in this part of the country. On the south side of it, at the entrance of the glen, our guide pointed out another spot, apparently inaccessible, which had been shown to him as a locality for the same pair of Eagles. Presently a whistle announced the arrival of the other party, and we observed with our glasses an Eagle fly into the hole, and soon leave it again. This gave rise to much speculation as to whether it was the cock or the hen. We now began to ascend ; and after a long climb up the mountain, over very broken ground, we began to get into the region of the nest. We climbed over a very rough rock or mass of rocks beneath the nest, and then came upon a huge crack in the rock, down which we rolled stones, making a great noise. Still ascending, we were perhaps a hundred yards below the nest when the Eagle left it, flapping slowly, the ends of her wings curling up at each stroke, till she was round a corner to the west, and we never saw her again ; but before this we had seen the cock bird high overhead. Then we went down a ravine in which there was a great drift of snow, and up the opposite side, where there was some rather ticklish climbing, till we recrossed on very slippery snow, and reached a succession of ledges or a little track on a level with the nest. For ' [During the past summer (1862) Mr. Wolf visited this nest, which then con- tained two young ones ; and I am indebted to him for the beautiful plate (tab. F. ) representing it, which has been executed from his sketch by Mr. Jury. — Ed.] AQUILA CHRYSAETUS. 27 some time past we had been finding the remains of Grouse and Moun- tain Hares ; and the head forester was afraid there were young. Great consequently was the interest at this point. We hurried round the corner, and my first exclamation was, "Two or three eggs, at all events ! " but another glance showed that there was only one white egg, and a young one hatched within a day or two, lying on its back chirping. The dogs (a Colley and a Terrier) had followed us into the nest and required restraining, as we were all of us at the side of the nest. The nest was in a little sort of cave in the face of the rock, which is ten or twelve feet wide, five or six feet high, and eight or ten feet deep, forming an admirable shelter ; but there was a good deal of dripping at the back part, which is overgrown with Ferns {Lasircea dilatata), Marchanti