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Show 1871.] RAPTORIAL BIRDS OF INDIA. 683 At first I found it impossible to get within shot of these Eagles, though I used a double-barrel No. 7 Duck-gun, carrying 7 drs. of powder and 2 oz. of shot. Latterly, however, I devised means by which a bird was hardly lost, and not only saved myself a considerable amount of ammunition, but also bodily suffering. Happening to be out one morning without my gun, I rode up to an Imperial which was perched on the top of a babool, some 25 feet high, in order to see how close the bird would allow me to approach. Having got to about 20 yards from the tree, and the bird showing no signs of uneasiness, I stalked her in a circuitous way (the same as one does when shooting Antelope), narrowing the circle each round I took, till at last I pulled up right under the tree, and looked the Eagle full in the face. She (sex judged from her size) was in the lineated stage, and kept her eyes fixed on me, apparently quite fascinated, and refused actually to fly notwithstanding I waved my hat at her. After this successful manoeuvre I gave up shooting Raptores on foot, and invariably rode up to them in the manner above described, making my shikaree carry a small gun on m y off-side, and giving him the order to fire when I got sufficiently close. The food of the Imperial Eagle is as disgusting as it is varied according to circumstances ; but I do not think the epithets " a great hulking Kite " and " ignoble feeder " * are justly applicable, at least not as far as m y experience goes. It is true that the bird will consort with Vultures over a dead Bullock, making a hearty meal thereof, and that I have on several occasions found Frogs in their crops ; but all Eagles will feed on carrion when pressed by hunger. I have found F. imperialis at times a bold and fearless bird, as the following anecdotes will show:-When encamped in the station of Eta, on the 7th of March last, I threw out the body of an Imperial which had just been skinned, and in a few moments I shot a brother Imperial in the act of tearing it to pieces, from my tent door. On another occasion a Wokab (Aquila fulvescens) had just deprived a Kite of the entrails of a Fowl, which again was immediately afterwards taken possession of by an Imperial, which in return fell to a charge of m y gun in the most public part of my camp. These instances are enough to show that m y friend Dr. Tristram has rightly depicted the character of this Eagle when he calls it a " truly imperial bird," and, again, that "there is a beauty and majesty in its movements, and in its greater fearlessness of man when in search of food, which at once attracts one"\. Though hunger will compel this bird to eat carrion, there is no doubt that it prefers better food. I have seen them times without number perched on the boughs of trees overlooking swamps, evidently on the look-out for Ducks. Early one morning, when out shooting (the sun had hardly risen), I heard the melancholy notes of the Brahminee Duck (Casarca rutila) overhead (a sound that must be familiar to every Indian sportsman), and five minutes later I saw a huge Imperial in the act of devouring * Rough Notes, part i. p. 145. t Ibis, 1865, p. 251. |