FEEDING OP THE YOUNG. 199 



titles of food for their young, frequently carrying off 

 for that purpose animals of considerable size, and 

 even children. The latter circumstance appears to 

 be well authenticated by a variety of independent 

 testimony. Amongst other instances, Sir Robert 

 Sibbald gives the following, which occurred in the 

 Orkneys. 



" An eagle seized a child a year old, which its 

 mother had left, wrapped up in some clothes, at a 

 place called Houton-Head, while she went for a few 

 moments to gather sticks for firewood, and carried it 

 a distance of four miles to Hoia ; which circumstance 

 being known from the cries of the mother, four men 

 went there in a boat ; and, knowing where the nest 

 was, found the child unhurt and untouched*." This 

 story, which all the compilers attribute to Ray, though 

 he does not even allude to it, seems to have furnished 

 the groundwork of the intensely-affecting tale of 

 * Hannah Lamond's Bairn V Anderson, also, in 

 his ' History of Iceland/ says, that there have been 

 instances of children, four or five years of age, being 

 carried off by eagles. 



It is highly probable, we think, that some incident 

 of this kind gave origin to the classic fable of Gany- 

 mede, said by Homer and Ovid J to have been carried 

 off by Jupiter, under the form of an eagle, to replace 

 Hebe as cup-bearer to the Olympian gods. That the 

 story was founded upon some real occurrence, may be 

 inferred from the spot being referred to by Strabo, 

 and from Herodian's allusion to it, though he says 

 41 Ganymede was torn in pieces by his brother, and 

 disappeared, which gave occasion to the report of 

 Jupiter's carrying him into heaven || ;" while Lac- 



* Prodromus, Nat. Hist. Scotise, vol. iii. part 2, p. 14. 



j* Blackwood's Magazine. 



J Metam, x. Apud Aldrovand. Ornith. i. 42. 



|| Hist. Vit. Coramod. i. 



