RED- FRONTED SWALLOW. 571 



week of September, the second brood and the parents join them. 

 They now roost exclusively on trees, which they usually quit 

 at sunrise, and resort to some sunny roof, where the livelong 

 day is spent in luxurious idleness, singing, and satisfying the 

 calls of hunger. Sometimes the leafless bough of an old tree 

 is selected for this purpose. Every morning parties of various 

 numbers leave the main flock, and betake themselves to corn- 

 fields in the neighbourhood of farm-buildings. Here they al- 

 most invariably choose the chimney of the steam-engine as the 

 centre of their frolics. At a given signal, the whole party rise 

 on wing," twittering and singing in chorus. After a short ex- 

 cursion, they return, most of them perching on the top, and 

 the rest on the side of the walls, the whole forming a scene on 

 which I am never tired of looking. But if you would contem- 

 plate this mysterious gathering in the true spirit of the season, 

 take a solitary ramble along the border of the wood that skirts 

 the meadow, the few wild flowers which still linger under the 

 shade of the tall hedge-row have a forlorn sweetness and beauty, 

 the fields are checkered with gold and green, the tints of the 

 foliage are gorgeous beyond description, all things speak of ma- 

 turity and subsequent decay, there is an exhilarating keenness 

 in the air, and yet the sober stillness of an autumnal day sheds 

 a gentle sadness over the scene, which even the distant song of 

 the reapers, and the gambols of the swallows hovering over the 

 pool, and perching on the old oak, fail to dispel. The spirit of 

 melancholy sighs through the gay foliage, sits in impressive 

 silence on the motionless curtain of thin grey clouds, and broods 

 over the landscape, from which stern winter will soon sweep 

 every object that charms the eye. ^Varned by the lengthen- 

 ing shadows, and the increasing chilness of the air, the swal- 

 lows join their companions, with whom they frolic for some 

 time previous to retiring to the trees. ^Vhen the morning has 

 at last come, when they must bid a long farewell to their na- 

 tive land, they seldom, as is their wont, divide into parties, 

 but fly oft' in a body for the green meadows of merry England, 

 there to linger for a few weeks longer, before they finally depart 

 for the evergreen borders of Africa. On the mornino- of the 

 24th September last, a flock passed over our reapers, casting no 



