It was then only, that the birds appeared to know of the approach of another intruder: they stretched forth their wide wings, and each of them, at the same moment, seized the lamb with one foot, and stood fluttering on the other, at the edge of the nest. Dingle reached out his left hand and dragged the child to him; and with his right, before you'd breathe, struck the bird that was nearest him--it was the cock--a blow on the head, with Bat Boroo's oaken cudgel, that knocked him over the edge of the nest; and down he fell, in a way that made those below think he was killed; but after falling many yards, he fluttered his wings, and soon recovered enough to fly to a resting-place. The hen, at the moment her mate got the blow, screamed so that the rocks rung with it, and got upon the wing. She wheeled round in the air, and rose, to all appearance, for the purpose of making a terrible stoop upon her enemy. There wasn't any time to be lost:--James Dingle pushed both the young eagles out of the nest; they were able to keep themselves up; and the ould hen, instead of making a descent upon James, altered her course, flew towards her young, and kept close to them, until they had reached, and were safe perched upon, the point of one of the peaks, that grew up by the side of the crag. While this was doing, Dingle got into the nest, bid Millet crawl back through the hole with the child, and in a short time followed. He had made up his mind to explore his way through the hills; for, thinks he, Misther Millet never could have got here, if the road's difficult; unless, indeed, the eagles carried him up; but that's not likely:--so I'll try; and it's odd, from this height, if I can't discover the way down, whatever may be said of its being impossible. The hen-eagle, too, kept hovering about, and would, no doubt, soon be joined by her mate; and--do you mark?--if he pulled up the rope by the cord he had, and let down the baby, the great chance was, whether one of the ould birds--to say nothing of the fear he had of its getting hurt against the rocks,--wouldn't pounce upon and destroy it, as it swung mid-way in the air. So he determined to try his luck, and began descending. Misther Millet amused him by his story as they wint: but the gentleman couldn't remember one inch of the way he came; and if Norah Cavanagh's child hadn't been carried off the way I tould you, Jack Dax would have lost a nephew, and the world Misther Millet: for I can't but think he'd have died somewhere about the hills, or been killed by the eagles; and so, one way or other, met with the same fate as the boy did that was seen in the nest long ago, and never got back.