88 BIRD WORLD. 



When the autumn comes, the tireless wings are 

 going to carry them to Mexico or Yucatan, where 

 they will find old friends, Kingbirds and Bobolinks, 

 and where new insects will taste as good to them as 

 New England flies and gnats. 



Watch a swallow hunting ! Every time he turns 

 quickly in his course, to this side or to that, another 

 insect has passed into that wide-open mouth. Count 

 them for a minute. The number quickly runs into the 

 tens and twenties. Now remember that a swallow is 

 on his feet, we should say, — on his wings, the swallows 

 would call it, — from four o'clock in the morning to 

 six at night, and longer in the June days. Multiply 

 the minutes; fourteen times sixty is over eight hun- 

 dred, is it not ? Now, supposing he caught ten insects 

 a minute, — and this is probably too few, — you can 

 see that a dozen swallows would make away with a 

 large army of insects, nearly all of which would plague 

 the cattle, or feed upon the farmer's fruit or vege- 

 tables. The farmer has no better or more hard- 

 workino^ servant than the swallow. He has a oood 

 right, has he not, to the shelter, for a month or so, of 

 the farmer's barn 1 



