Eagle's Nest

“ Few earthly joys come without some drawbacks. It caused great dissatisfaction in the fort that the birth of the chief's first-born son was not celebrated by the gluttonous revels and superstitious orgies which had never before been omitted in the Eagle's Nest on such a joyful occasion. Sheep indeed had been killed, and a banquet provided; but vice and profanity had been excluded, and to the special indignation of the old women, not a single charm against the evil eye had been tied around the neck of the babe! ”

“ Soon the far-famed Eagle’s Nest is reached, a rugged, precipitous cliff 1,700 feet high. Here the eagles still have their nest, for Nature has secured them from the hand of man. It is a very majestic rock, thickly clothed with evergreens nearly to the summit, where, however, heath and a few scattered shrubs hide the nest, and show the great outline, the rugged mass, in stern sublimity. Here the Killarney Echo is best heard. ”

“ Eagle’s Nest was the name of a small area on the top of a beetling cliff whose almost perpendicular wall was dotted with clumps of sturdy little cedar trees growing out of the chinks. It was a dizzy place at all times, but by night the effect of its airy height was very trying on any but the best nerves. Crane and Peck both were men of fine physique and were possessed of stubborn courage and great combativeness. ”

“ It's quite perfect!" cried the twins some time later, when, hot and panting, they at last dropped their burdens beneath the great beech-tree by the wall.
"I really think it's pretty good," replied Madge modestly. She felt that as she had invented this plan herself it would not be good manners for her to admire it too freely. "You see those two boughs poking out like great arms over the field? The sticks must be long enough to stretch from one to the other, and the Eagle's Nest when it is built will be between them." ”

“ Climbing up to the Eagle’s nest she said to the Eagle, “You and I are in the greatest possible danger. That dreadful creature, the Sow, who is always to be seen grubbing away at the foot of the tree, means to uproot it, that she may devour your family and mine at her ease.” Having thus driven the Eagle almost out of her senses with terror, the Cat climbed down the tree, and said to the Sow, “I must warn you against that dreadful bird, the Eagle. She is only waiting her chance to fly down and carry off one of your little pigs when you take them out, to feed her brood with.” ”

“ The Eagle, whose nest was high in an old hollow tree, thought herself secure from all projects of revenge, and so bore away the Cub to her young ones, without shewing any regard to the supplications of the Fox. But that subtle creature, highly incensed at this outrageous barbarity, ran to an altar, where some country people had been sacrificing a kid in the open fields,274 and catching up a fire-brand in her mouth, made towards the tree where the Eagle’s nest was, with a resolution of revenge. ”

“ Owen climbed a tree to a White-headed Eagle's nest, and drove a young one out, which fell to the ground and was caught alive, and brought to the fort. Is it not very remarkable that Eagles of this species should have their young in the nest at this late season, when in the Floridas I have shot them of the same size in February? Shot at a Wolf, which being wounded, went off about one hundred yards, and yelled like a dog; a very remarkable instance, as all we have killed or wounded, and they have been many, rarely make any sound, and if they do it is simply a snapping at their pursuer. ”

“ The principal attraction in this picture is Eagle Rock, which occupies a prominent position in the foreground. On the top of the rock there is an eagle’s nest, from which many a young brood has taken its flight, for from all the indications the nest has been in existence for centuries. ”

“ Everything connected with the Eagle's Nest took much more time and labour than was ever expected. It sounds an easy thing enough to make a rope-ladder when once the materials have been collected. But even with Barton's ropes, and Nurse's best ball of string, which John had quietly brought away in his pocket, it was no simple matter. ”

“ It is just possible that there comes a time of life when the heart does not beat responsively at the bare suggestion of a rope-ladder. Then a desert island will have lost its charm, and wild beasts be no longer a source of terror or interest. Betty and John had, fortunately for them, not yet reached this miserable epoch. At their sister's last words they shouted and danced about on the uneven sticks until they were in imminent danger of falling out of the Eagle's Nest much faster than they climbed in. ”

“ Whether Jack was more active even than they had credited him with being, or whether the twins pushed harder than had been expected, will never be known. At all events, long before Madge was firmly seated on the Eagle's Nest there was a terrific scramble, and the goat bounded past her almost knocking her out of the tree. In the struggle not to fall she very naturally dropped the leading-string and clung with both hands to a bough. Jack took advantage of his opportunity. ”

“ Thus he stayed until an eagle caught sight of him, pounced right down, and flew off with him to her nest, which was on a huge rock that rose straight up into the cold air and made the summit of a mountain.
When the old eagle plumped the little old man down into the nest, just imagine, if you can, how astonished the eaglets were! They opened their beaks as well as their eyes, and cried out:
"What's this, mother? What is this?"
"Oh! it's only a man," cried the old eagle. ”

“ The Great Eagle, he knew, would swoop down upon him and kill him with a blow of his powerful beak and claws. But when the boy slept, he saw his mother in his slumber. And she said to him, "To-morrow when Great Eagle goes from the nest, brace your knife, point upwards, against the rock. When he swoops down to kill you his breast will strike the knife, and he will be pierced to death. You are not strong enough to cut through his feathers with your knife, but he is powerful enough to destroy himself." The next morning when Great Eagle went out, the boy did as the vision of the night had told him. ”

“ For many years, however, it had been well understood that this was the chosen home of Wambelee, the eagle, whom it is not well to molest.
Doubtless there have been tragedies enacted upon this imposing summit. There is even a tradition among the wild Red men that the supremacy upon old Eagle's Nest has cost many lives, and for this reason it is held to be a mysterious and hallowed place. Certainly the tribes of Wild Land had cause to desire and even to fight for its possession. ”

“ One thinks of Stirling and of the castles frowning down upon the Rhine as he comes out of the wide, flat marsh beneath this great nest, crowning this loftiest eminence in all the region. But no château of the Alps, no beetling crag-lodged castle of the Rhine, can match the fish-hawk's nest for sheer boldness and daring. Only the eagles' nests upon the fierce dizzy pinnacles in the Yosemite surpass the home of the fish-hawk in unawed boldness. The aery of the Yosemite eagle is the most sublimely defiant of things built by bird, or beast, or man. ”

“ Walter, with the eagerness of one who has succeeded in an object on which his heart has been set, was impatient to reach the Eagle's Nest; but he had to slacken his pace to suit a companion not accustomed, like himself, to ascend mountains with almost the agility of the chamois. The way was often too narrow to admit of the two men walking abreast; but, in other parts, its comparative breadth permitted conversation between them. Mr. Coldstream heard, with great interest, particulars of the fate of poor Dermot Denis.
"I never saw a man with a finer physique," he observed ”

“ While the side of the mountain on which the eagles had built their nest was quite precipitous, the back part was easily scaled, so that hunters with level heads could climb, by being careful, up so high that they could really look down into the eagle’s nest. ”

“ In another moment he was sitting on the Eagle's Nest.
"This is a goodish sort of tree," he remarked, looking round with a patronizing air. "Very easy to climb, of course—"
"Oh, but I can go much higher than these boughs by the wall!" interrupted Betty. "So high that my feet are where your head is now."
"That's not much," said Lewis scornfully. "Girls never can climb much. They just flop about, and catch their frocks in all the branches, and get giddy, and cry to be helped down again!" ”

“ The eaglet, who was lying in the midst of this, was repulsive to look upon, with his big, gaping bill, his awkward, down-clad body, and his undeveloped wings where the prospective quills stuck out like thorns.
At last Akka conquered her repugnance and alighted on the edge of the nest, at the same time glancing about her anxiously in every direction, for each second she expected to see the old eagles coming back.
"It is well that some one has come at last," cried the baby eagle. ”

“ The United States seems to have an abiding faith in the great bird, as our minted dollars show.
The nest of the Bald Eagle is usually placed upon the top of a giant tree, standing far up on the side of a mountain, among myriads of twining vines, or on the summit of a high inaccessible rock. The nest in the course of years, becomes of great size as the Eagle lays her eggs year after year in the same nest, and at each nesting season adds new material to the old nest. ”

“ Scenery is fine—but human nature is finer—the sward is richer for the tread of a real nervous English foot—the Eagle’s nest is finer, for the Mountaineer has looked into it. ”

“ It was a bullfinch’s nest, which had been set in the fork of a sapling tree, where it needed an extended foundation. And the bird had built this first story of her nest with withered stalks of clematis blossom; and with nothing else. These twigs it had interwoven lightly, leaving the branched heads all at the outside, producing an intricate Gothic boss of extreme grace and quaintness, apparently arranged both with triumphant pleasure in the art of basket-making, and with definite purpose of obtaining ornamental form. ”

“ They commence making fresh additions to their nest early in the year; and the female deposits her eggs in January, and hatches the young by the middle of the following month. Robbers as they are, the white-headed eagles exhibit great parental affection, tending their young as long as they are helpless and unfledged; nor will they forsake them even should the tree in which their nest is built be surrounded by flames. Wilson, the American naturalist, mentions seeing a tree cut down in order to obtain an eagle’s nest. ”

“ But the Eagle was not to put off for long the punishment due to her violation of the sacred tie of friendship. It happened that some country-people were sacrificing a goat, and the Eagle flew down and carried away from the altar some of the burning flesh. But when she had got it to her eyrie a strong wind got up and kindled into flame the thin dry twigs of the nest, so that the eaglets, being too young to be able to fly, were roasted, and fell to the ground. Then the Fox ran up and, before the Eagle's eyes, devoured them every one. ”

“ Walter paused, for he was conscious that he was speaking to one who had no sympathy with any such hope.
"What is it?" inquired the Irishman; "I thought that you always left the hoping to me."
"I hope that I have been led here to do some good to these wild Afghans, and specially to that most interesting child Sultána."
"Do you mean that you have been self-appointed to act as a kind of honorary missionary in the Eagle's Nest—a shepherd—or rather a wolf-herd to a gang of Afghan robbers?"
"God can make use of the weakest instruments," said Walter, rather speaking to himself than to Denis. ”

“ There in the nest, right upon the rocky heights, are the eaglets. The mother eagle comes and, taking hold of them, flings them out of the nest. They were so comfortable there, but she flings them right out of the nest, high above the earth. They begin to fall straightway. They never have been in air before; they have always been in the nest. ”

“ Every one with whom the young man entered on the subject, more or less condemned his plan as impracticable and wild. Yet Walter could not let himself be persuaded that a resolution made with earnest prayer should be put aside because man thought it unwise. The remembrance of the blessing which had followed his efforts in the Eagle's Nest could not be blotted out by college professors speaking of wasting talents, which would give him influence over thousands of educated minds, on a few bloodthirsty Afghans. ”

“ No; morn and even the little band of Christians in the Eagle's Nest were remembered in earnest prayer. But it is natural that visible surroundings and the interests of daily life should engage more constant attention than what belongs to memory alone. During the fascinating two years which Walter passed at college, he received no communication of any kind from his friends in the fort. Walter wrote repeatedly to Ali Khan in a large printed hand, which he had taught Sultána to read, but it need hardly be said that there was no available post to the mountain home. ”

“ But the Eagle, in wrath, gave the Beetle a flap with his wing, and straightway seized upon the Hare and devoured him. When the Eagle flew away, the Beetle flew after him, to learn where his nest was, and getting into it, he rolled the Eagle's eggs out of it one by one, and broke them. The Eagle, grieved and enraged to think that any one should attempt so audacious a thing, built his nest the next time in a higher place ”