started up, and saw her baby thrown down and dragged several feet by a Bald Eagle, when happily the infant's dress gave way, and the bird rose, carrying off a fragment of it in his talons. The length of these birds is three feet; extent of wings, seven feet. The female, as usual with birds of prey, is the largest and most daring. They are not at all bald, as their name would imply, but, in fact, hoary-headed: the plumage of the whole head and neck being white; the tail and wing-coverts are also white; the rest of the plumage is chiefly brown; the legs and bill are of a golden yellow.
There is another gigantic fishing Eagle, called the Washington Eagle, a very rare bird, described by Mr. Audubon as decidedly larger; its length is three feet seven inches; extent of wings, ten feet two inches. They build upon the rocks along the Upper Mississippi.
Long may the Bald Eagle continue to be the national emblem of a vigorous and a united people, as long as the bird soars over the broad land! It must prove a dark hour for the country when either wing is maimed. There are always, in every community, in public as in private life, those who are not afraid to assume a character which the wise man has declared “an abomination” in the sight of their God; yes, this character “doth the Lord hate”—“he that soweth discord among brethren.”
If, in the subject of a monarchy, loyalty to the sovereign be a just and a generous sentiment,—and most assuredly it is so,—still more noble in character is the nature of that loyalty which has for object a sacred bond, uniting in one family the beating hearts, the active spirits, the intelligent minds of millions of men; brethren in blood and in faith!
