One said, "It is surely a waterfowl, a duck, or it may be a goose; if we took it to the water it would swim and gabble." But another said, "It has no webs to its feet; it is a barn-door fowl; should you let it loose it will scratch and cackle with the others on the dung-heap." But a third speculated, "Look now at its curved beak; no doubt it is a parrot, and can crack nuts!" But a fourth said, "No, but look at its wings; perhaps it is a bird of great flight." But several cried, "Nonsense! No one has ever seen it fly! Why should it fly?
Can you suppose that a thing can do a thing which no one has ever seen it do ?" And the bird--the bird--with its leg chained close to the log, preened its wing.
So they sat about it, speculating, and discussing it: and one said this, and another that.

And all the while as they talked the bird sat motionless, with its gaze fixed on the clear, blue sky above it.

And one said, "Suppose we let the creature loose to see what it will do ?"--and the bird shivered.

But the others cried, "It is too valuable; it might get lost.

If it were to try to fly it might fall down and break its neck." And the bird, with its foot chained to the log, sat looking upward into the clear blue sky; the sky, in which it had never been--for the bird--the bird, knew what it would do--because it was an eaglet! There is one woman known to many of us, as each human creature knows but one on earth; and it is upon our knowledge of that woman that we base our certitude.
For those who do not know her, and have not this ground, it is probably profitable and necessary that they painfully collect isolated facts and then speculate upon them, and base whatever views they should form upon these collections.