and upper tail-coverts are of the
same white hue as the head and neck. He and his mate build their nest
in some lofty tree amid a swamp; and repairing it every season, it
becomes of great size. Its position is generally known by the offensive
odour arising from the number of fish scattered around, which they have
let drop after their predatory excursions. The nest is roughly formed
of large sticks, moss, roots, and tufts of grass. They commence making
fresh additions to their nest early in the year; and the female deposits
her eggs in January, and hatches the young by the middle of the
following month. Robbers as they are, the white-headed eagles exhibit
great parental affection, tending their young as long as they are
helpless and unfledged; nor will they forsake them even should the tree
in which their nest is built be surrounded by flames. Wilson, the
American naturalist, mentions seeing a tree cut down in order to obtain
an eagle's nest. The parent birds continued flying clamorously round,
and could with difficulty be driven away from the bodies of their
fledgelings, killed by the fall of the lofty pine.

Audubon gives us an account of a savage attack he once witnessed made by
an eagle and his mate on a swan:--The fierce eagle, having marked the
snow-white bird as his prey, summons his companion. As the swan is
passing near the dreaded pair, the eagle, in preparation for the chase,
starts from his perch on a tall pine, with an awful scream, that to the
swan brings more terror than, the report of the largest duck-gun. Now
is the moment to witness the display of the eagle's power. He glides
through the air like a falling star, and comes upon the timorous quarry,
which now, in agony and despair, seeks by varied manoeuvres to elude the
grasp of his cruel talons. Now it mounts, now doubles, and would
willingly plunge into the stream, were it not prevented by the eagle,
who, knowing that by such a stratagem the swan might escape him, forces
it to remain in the air by his attempts to strike it with his talons
from beneath. The swan has already become much weakened, and its
strength fails at sight of the courage and swiftness of its antagonist.
At one moment it seems about to escape, when the ferocious eagle strikes
with his talons the under side of its wing, and with an unresisted power
forces the bird to fall in a slanting direction upon the nearest shore.
Pouncing downwards, the eagle is soon joined by his mat