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twisted together. Seldom a year passes, but they take the brood,
or eggs, and sometimes they shoot one, sometimes the other,
parent; but the survivor has always found a mate (probably in
Ireland) and they breed near the old place. By his description I
learn that this species is the Erne, the vulture Abicilla of
Linnaeus in his last edition (but in your's Falco Albicilla) so
consult him and Pennant about it.
We returned leisurely home the way we came, but saw a new
landscape; the features indeed were the same in part, but many
new ones were disclosed by the mid-day sun, and the tints were
entirely changed: take notice this was the best, or perhaps the
only day for going up Skiddaw, but I thought it better employed;
it was perfectly serene, and hot as mid-summer.
In the evening I walked alone down to the lake, by the side of
Crow-park, after sun-set, and saw the solemn colouring of the
night draw on, the last gleam of sun-shine fading away on the
hill tops, the deep serene of the waters, and the long shadows of
the mountains thrown across them, till they nearly touched the
hithermost shore. At a distance were heard the murmurs of many
water-falls, not audible in the day time; I wished for the moon,
but she was dark to me, and silent,
Hid in her vacant interlunar cave.
Oct. 4. I walked to Crow-park, now a rough pasture, once a glade
of ancient oaks, whose large roots still remain in the ground,
but nothing has sprung from them. If one single tree had
remained, this would have been an unparalleled spot: and Smith
judged right when he took his print of the lake from hence, for
it is a gentle eminence, not too high, on the very margin of the
water, and commanding it from end to end, looking full into the
gorge of Borrowdale. I prefer it even to Cockshut-hill, which
lies beside it, and to which I walked in the afternoon; it is
covered with young
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