That was just after we reached the big lake, where I saw him robbing the fish-hawk.  After much searching and watching I found a great log by the outlet where Old Whitehead often perched.  There was a big eddy hard by, on the edge of a shallow, and he used to sit on the log, waiting for fish to come out where he could wade in and get them.  There was a sickness among the suckers that year (it comes regularly every few years, as among rabbits), and they would come struggling out of the deep water to rest on the sand, only to be caught by the minks and fish-hawks and bears and Old Whitehead, all of whom were waiting and hungry for fish.

For several days I put a big bait of trout and whitefish on the edge of the shallows.  The first two baits were put out late in the afternoon, and a bear got them both the next night.  Then I put them out in the early morning, and before noon Cheplahgan had found them.  He came straight as a string from his watch place over the mountain, miles away, causing me to wonder greatly what strange sixth sense guided him; for sight and smell seemed equally out of the question.  The next day he came again.  Then I placed the best bait of all in the shallows, and hid in the dense underbrush near, with my gun.

He came at last, after hours of waiting, dropping from above the tree-tops with a heavy rustling of pinions.  And as he touched the old log, and spread his broad white tail, I saw and was proud of the gap which my bullet had made weeks before.  He stood there a moment erect and splendid, head, neck, and tail a shining white; even the dark brown feathers of his body glinted in the bright sunshine.  And he turned his head slowly from side to side, his keen eyes flashing, as if he would say, “Behold, a king!” to Chigwooltz the frog, and Tookhees the wood mouse, and to any other chance wild creature that might watch him from the underbrush at his unkingly act of feeding on dead fish.  Then he hopped down—­rather awkwardly, it must be confessed; for he is a creature of the upper deeps, who cannot bear to touch the earth—­seized a fish, which he tore to pieces with his claws and ate greedily.  Twice I tried to shoot him; but the thought of the wilderness without him was upon me, and held me back.  Then, too, it seemed so mean to pot him from ambush when he had come down to earth, where he was at a disadvantage; and when he clutched some of the larger fish in his talons, and rose swiftly and bore away westward, all desire to kill him was gone.  There were little Cloud Wings, it seemed, which I must also find and watch.  After that I hunted him more diligently than before, but without my gun.  And a curious desire, which I could not account for, took possession of me:  to touch this untamed, untouched creature of the clouds and mountains.

Next day I did it.  There were thick bushes growing along one end of the old log on which the eagle rested.  Into these I cut a tunnel with my hunting-knife, arranging the tops in such a way as to screen me more effectively.  Then I put out my bait, a good two hours before the time of Old Whitehead’s earliest appearance, and crawled into my den to wait.