My mother once told me this story. When I was three months old, my parents took me camping in northern Wisconsin. We stayed in a small tent. My father went hunting, so my mother sat in a sunny clearing near the tent and put me on a pink blanket nearby. She soon noticed a large bird, possibly a bald eagle, looming high above. Each time it circled, the raptor dropped a little lower. Directly over me. My mother rushed over to me, and quickly gathered me back to the tent, safe from a dangerous predator.
Frederick Leighton (1830–1896) catches such a moment in his painting, “A Boy Defending a Baby From an Eagle.” Unaware of its danger, a small sleeping baby would be an easy meal for a large raptor. Perhaps the parents thought the child safe in a covered area….