4i6 



THE WHITE-THROATED SWIFT. 



3, narrowh- subelliptical. 0.87x0.32, white" (Cones). Season: May and June. 



General Range. — Western United States from the Rocky Mountains to the 

 Pacific, north to Montana, Idaho, and southern British CoUnnliia ( r)i<anagan 

 \'alley) ; south in winter to Guatemala. 



Range in Washington. — Known only from the valley of the Columbia near 

 Chelan, the (".rand Coulee (near Cold Spring Lake), and the Cascade Pass. 



Authorities. — Dawson, Auk, XI\'., 1897, p. 175. 



Specimens. — C. 



SWIFT, swifter, swiftest, will best express the relations (if mir Wash- 

 ington Cyl^scli. where the positi\e degree is represented by the Vaiix Swift, 

 the comparative by the Black Clmid Swift, and the superlative by the White- 

 throat. No one who is troubled with acrophobia, the fear of high places, 

 should attempt to spy upon the nesting haunts of these Swifts from above; 

 for when to the ordinary terrors of a sheer cliff, say a thousand feet in 

 height, is added the hurtling passage of resentful Swifts flashing about like 

 hurled scimetars, the situation will try the strongest nerve. Mewed from 

 below, in the open air, the evolutions of these birds may be regarded with 

 some degree of equanimity; but when a Swift dips toward the ground, or 

 measures its speed across the face of .some frowning precipice, one sees 

 what a really frightful velocity 

 is attained. There is no exact 

 wav of measiu'ing tliis, but an 

 estimate of five miles per minute 

 would he well within the mark, 

 and six not unreasonable. The 

 bird, that is. would require only 



Photo by the Author. 

 Taken in Douglas County. 



COLD Sl'KlM, L.VKli. 



WHITE-THROATED SWIFTS NEST ON THE PRECIPITOUS WALLS OF THE BUTTE. 



