Few varieties of birds enlivened our forest gloom; the most numerous were the crows and black magpies; but none of the sweetly-singing pied magpies are seen nearer Port Sorell than the Avenue Plain; and much as I missed my pleasant merry friends, I could not but applaud their taste in frequenting any part of the island rather than this most dreary and disagreeable district.

Now and then, two, three, or four lordly eagles might be seen soaring grandly high overhead at the same time, and once we saw as many as seven together, and marvelled much what so grave an augury portended. As all things edible were scarce in the vicinity, we sometimes thought that our goats, with their young kids, might possibly attract the attention of the eagles; but I must freely exonerate them from all charge of theft—they never molested any of our live stock. I cannot give an equally good character to their disreputable kinsfolk, the hawks, who were bolder and more rapacious than any I had seen before, coming and sitting quite composedly on the very hen-house itself, and swooping into the veranda after my pet guinea-fowls with insufferable audacity. White hawks, so rare in most parts of the island, were numerous here; they are most superb birds, with plumage soft as satin, and whiter even than snow; and radiant piercing eyes, so bold and bright!