The Child and The Eagle*
Connected with Carrigan Head there is a legend told, and duly authenticated, regarding a child that was carried off by an eagle. It is given here as it was dictated by Nannie O'Byrne, of Malinbeg, a lineal descendant of the person that occupies the chief place in the story.
About two hundred years ago, there lived in a place called Croughlin (a village through which the tourist passes on his way to Carrigan Head) a man named MacGinley, his wife, and an only child named Brighid or Bridget, who was two and a-half years old at the period of our story. One fine day in summer little Bridget happened to be playing out of doors with a child a little older than herself, while her mother inside was cheerfully employed behind her wheel spinning, and accompanying the hum of the machine with the music of her own sweet voice.
Suddenly, the elder of the two little girls rushed into the cottage in a state of great perturbation, and announced to the mother of little Bridget that her child had been carried off by a great bird. The terror-stricken parent dashed her wheel aside, and sprang out to the relief of her darling child; but alas! The eagle had already taken his flight, carrying little Bridget along with him, higher and higher over the tops of the hills.
She saw him soaring aloft in mid-air, bearing away her beloved child, that seemed as if ready to drop from his talons, but vainly struggling to free herself from the rude clasp of his piercing claws, while the shrill, piteous cry of the little creature, and her frequent utterances of that rapturously endearing word "mamma," brought the tears of helpless sympathy to many an eyelid, besides those of her distracted mother.
The eagle takes his flight over the summit of the steep hill behind, carrying, likely, to his eyrie in the brink of the cliff over Bunglas, the welcome offering to the eaglets nestled there. Oh! What a pang rends the mother's tender heart when she thinks of the feast of blood soon to be indulged in by the voracious young eagles! How they will tear her own dear little darling limb from limb, and dip their cruel beaks into her resking vitals, and with their merciless claws scatter her child's entrails among the sharp rocks.
But oh! horror of horrors! Instead of going direct to his home in the cliff, the eagle is observed to speed over the sea in the direction of the Connaught shores. Had he borne the child to his nest, there was at least this consolation, the possibility of rescuing the dead body-torn and mutilated though it might be from its place of deposit. But there he shapes his bold course over the briny wave, getting smaller and smaller by distance. The wails of the mother had collected a crowd of the villagers, who, of course, could do nothing but gaze after the speck hanging over the ocean, which every moment appeared lessening to the sight.
Onward towards the cliffs moved the excited crowd, until they stood on a lofty eminence overlooking the sea, not far from Carrigan Head.
One old man, who happened to be present, at last startled the be-wildered assembly by ejaculating, "Cease your silly gazing. What can we or any human being do now to arrest the progress of the wild bird of the mountain?
There is only one power that can control him-the power of God. Our help is in the name of the Lord who made Heaven and earth. Let us fall on our knees, then, and pray fervently for the return of the eagle, and the preservation of the child; and our united prayers will move Heaven in our behalf." Immediately all knelt down as if in obedience to some impulse unfelt till that moment, and imploringly raised their hearts and their hands to heaven, beseeching God to exert His Almighty power, and show forth His tender mercy in this extremity. Their eyes were still riveted on the tiny speck that hung over the distant sea.
Only a few of the young and sharp-sighted could constantly keep it in view; to most of the others the dark mite in the distant sky appeared as if altogether blotted out of existence.
Suddenly a youngster exclaimed that he thought the speck was becoming somewhat larger. Instantly three or four voices chimed in a corroboration, Soon it became the general conviction, for the speck became observable to all as it rose slowly higher and higher up against the background of the sky, and was every moment assuming larger proportions, till it took the proper shape of a flying eagle.
Attention was now attracted to the little bulk that appeared suspended beneath it; soon the tiny shape becomes discernible, and thereafter-thrice happy sight! it was observed to be still struggling. The crowd now rushed in the direction of the eyrie, hastening to snatch away the dear little victim, if deposited there. But the eagle heeded not the eyrie. He alighted on Carrigan Head, on the very spot whereon this watch-tower now stands, and in a little while after darted off in the direction of Malinbeg, but relieved of his burden.
The crowd, now considerably augmented, hastened to the Carrigan. The delighted mother, who, on the approach of the eagle, was, by her motherly instincts, led at once to the spot where she knew her child would be deposited, was the first to lay hold of her darling treasure, and almost devour it with her maternal kisses. On coming within view of the place, she discovered her beloved child lying on the green grass, on the brink of the cliff, calling lustily for her "mamma." On perceiving her mamma running towards her, the little one raised herself on her feet, and began to complain that the naughty bird had made holes on her side; and on examining her, both sides of her chest were found to be a good deal lacerated, from the tight grip of the eagle's talons. The whole assembly then knelt on the green sward, and gave thanks to God for this visible manifestation of His mercy and power on their behalf, and for the wonderful preservation of the peasant's child.
She was afterwards married to a man named Donnegan, and lived for nearly a hundred years. She had the marks of the eagle's talons in her chest till her death.
This story was related to the writer by Nannie O'Byrne, of Malinbeg, now upwards of 80 years of age. She had frequently heard it from her own father, who was the grandson of our heroine, and who, when a mere boy, often heard it narrated by the old woman herself.
Occasionally she would exhibit, as a verification of the story, the cicatrices remaining on her chest, by the wounds sustained from the eagle's talons, during her involuntary passage through the air.
*From the book "The Cliff Scenery of South-Western Donegal" by Thomas Colin McGinley (Kinnfaela) 1867
