64 ORNITHOLOGICAL RAMBLES. 



season, and have not as yet taken up their permanent 

 abode. In the old chronicles of the island I find these 

 words : " There are many eagles, especially at the 

 west end of the main, and in Choye. I was very 

 well informed that an eagle did take up a swaddled 

 child a month old, which the mother had laid 

 down until she went to the back of the peat stack 

 at Honton Head, and carried it to Choye, viz. four 

 miles, which being discovered by a traveller, who 

 heard the lamentations of the mother, four men 

 went presently thither in a boat, and, knowing the 

 eagle's nest, found the child, without any prejudice 

 done to it." 



Beverting to the proximity of nests, I observe an 

 announcement in the ( Court Journal ' of this week 

 of curious ornithological interest ; "On the Ryes 

 Hall farm near Sudbury, Suffolk, there is a nest 

 containing six young hawks, an owl's nest with 

 five young ones, a starling's nest with sir young 

 ones, and another with three young ones, all on 

 the same tree, and within about two feet of each 

 other." 



This vast assemblage of the feathered tribe gave one 

 a good idea of the uproar that ensues after the explo- 

 sion of a cannon from a passing steamer, and I quote 

 the following from Miss Sinclair's 'Shetland.' "Our 

 steamboat passed near Coppensha, one of the Orkneys, 

 which presents a gigantic barricade of rocks, inhabited 



