The Eagle

The tawny Eagle seats his callow brood
High on the cliff, and feasts his young with blood:
On Snowdon rocks, or Orkney’s wide domain,
Whose beetling cliffs o’er hang the Western main,
The royal bird his lonely kingdom forms,
Amidst the gathering clouds and sullen storms;
Through the wide waste of air he darts his sight,
And holds his sounding pinions poised for flight;
With cruel eye premeditates the war,
And marks his destined victim from afar:
Descending in a whirlwind to the ground,
His pinions like the rush of waters sound:
The fairest of the fold he bears away,
And to his nest compels the struggling prey;
He scorns the game by meaner hunters tore,
And dips his talons in no vulgar gore.