56 HISTORY OF 



he was thus employed, as their resentment might have been 

 dangerous. 



It happened some time ago, in the same country, that a 

 peasant resolved to rob the nest of an eagle, that had built in a 

 small island in the beautiful lake of Eallarney. He accordingly 

 stripped, and swam in upon the island while the old ones were 

 away ; and, robbing the nest of its young, he was preparing to 

 swim back, with the eaglets tied in a string ; but while he was 

 yet up to his chin in the water, the old eagles returned, and, 

 missing their young, quickly fell upon the plunderer, and, in 

 spite of all his resistance, despatched him with their beaks and 

 talons. • 



In order to extirpate these pernicious birds, there is a law in 

 the Orkney Islands, which entitles any person that kills an eagle 

 to a hen out of every house in the parish in which the plunderer 

 is killed. 



The nest of the eagle is usually built in the most inaccessible 

 cliff of the rock, and often shielded from the weather by some 

 jutting crag that hangs over it. Sometimes, however, it is wholly 

 exposed to the winds, as well sideways as above ; for the nest is 

 flat, though built with great labour. It is said that the same 

 nest serves the eagle during life ; and indeed the pains bestowed 

 in forming it seems to argue as much. One of these was found 

 in the Peak of Derbyshire ; which Willoughby thus describes. 

 " It was made of great sticks, resting one end on the edge of a 

 rock, the other on two birch trees. Upon these was a layer of 

 rushes, and over them a layer of heath, and upon the heath rushes 

 again : upon which lay one young one, and an addle egg ; and by 

 them a lamb, a hare, and three heath-poults. The nest was 



• A gentleman who lived in the south of Scotland, had, not many years 

 ago, a tame eagle, which the keeper one day injudiciously thought proper, 

 for some petty fault, to lash with a horse-whip. About a week afterwards, 

 the man chanced to stoop within reach of his chain, when the euraged ani. 

 mal recollecting the late insult, flew in his face with so much fury and vio- 

 lencp, that he was terribly wounded, but was luckily driven so far back by 

 the blow as to be out of all further danger. Tlie screams of the eagle 

 itlarmed the family, who found the man lying at some distance in a very 

 bloody condition, equally stunned with the fright and falL Tlie animal was 

 still pacing and screaming in a manner not less formidable than mi^jestic 

 It WIS even dreaded whether, in so violent a rage, he might not break loose ; 

 which, indeed, fortunately perhaps for them, he did, jast as they withdrew, 

 and thus escaped for ever. 



