Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1903-06-24
Whipp0dDy EagleS
BIZ DALLAS LORE SHARP.

The old professor shared his "den"
with me, aud after the days work in
the museum heawould often sit before
the tiny CRATE fire and talk. punched
the fire and listened.
when did begin my life as a nat
uralist?" he replied to question from
me. II wont know. l can't remem-
Der the day I wasn't collecting some
thing" Then, after pause, "But
can remember the day 1 stopped col
lecting one thing"
What thing?" I asked.
Birds eggs. No, it wasn't because
the minister got after me or the school
teacher or my conscience-althoug
that has never stopped troubling me
since. 1t was two birds that got after
me. was trying to rob them, and
they whipped me-thrashed me so thor
oughly that I have been ashamed ever
since to steal any kind of birds eggs.
And that's been since I was seventeen.
"About five miles from our house, en-
the edge of a salt marsh, called Moses
Windows, stood an eagle tree, the
home of a famous pair of bald heads.
The eagles were known all over the
county, and the ancient nest had a
place in the chart of every FISHERMAN
in the bay.
II had looked away toward that nest
ever since l could remember. had
often stood beneath it's great tree and
gazed up at it, always with longing
to mount to it and lay hands on the
eggs. To stand up in that eagles nest
was the peak of all my boy ambitions.
''And l did it. I had the eggs of
those eagles in my hands, but only
once. %t+
1.-The tree was stark old white oak,
almost limbiess, and standing alone on
the marsh. The eagles nest capped
its very top.
|'The nest had always seemed big,
but not until climbed up close under
It did | realize that it was the size OF
a small haystack There was certainly
half cord of wood in it. | think that
it must originally have been built by
fish hawks.
Holding to the forking top upon
which the nest was placed, reached
out. but could not touch the edge from
any side.
81 had come determined to get up
into it, however, at all hazard, and SO
I set to work | never thought of
how l was to get down, nor never
dreamed, either. of fearing the eagles.
"A bald-headed eagle is bully. |
would have soon have thought OF fear
ing our kissing old gander at home.
"As could not get out to the edge OF
the nest and scale the walls, the only
possible way up, apparently, was
through the structure. The sticks
here in the bottom was old and quite
rotten Digging was easy, and | soon
had a good beginning.
'"The structure was somewhat cone
shaped, the smaller end down. 1t had
grown in circumference as it had
grown in years and in height, probably
because at the bottom the building ma
terials had decayed and gradually fall
len away. until now there was de-
cided outward slant from bottom to
TOP. 1t had grown lopsided, too, there
being a big bulge on one side of the
nest near the middle.
THE smalIness of the bottom at first
helped me; there was less of the stuff
tn be pulled out I easily broke away
8he dead timbers and pushed aside the
tougher sticks. I intended to cut a
channel clear to the top and go UP
through the structure. Already my
head and shoulders were well into the
nest.
"Now the work became more diff
cuIt, The sticks were newer, some OF
them being of seasoned oak and nick
ory which the birds had taken 1rom
cOrd-wood piles.
81 had cut my channel up the size OF
the nest nearly half way when | came
to a forked branch that could neither
break nor push aside. soon foune
that it was not loose, but that it be
1onged to the oak tree itself. 1t rar
out through the nest horizontally, ex