578 HIRUNDO URBICA. 



different manner, for they alight by the edge of a pool, or brook, 

 often on the street or road after rain, select a portion, seize it 

 with their bill, fly off to their nest, and apply it in its wet state 

 to the edge of the unfinished crust, which they thus gradually 

 build from the bottom upwards, until it is completed. The 

 different pellets thus carried are discernible in the finished nest, 

 which is externally knobbed or tuberculated, generally very 

 friable when dry, and without any intermixture of glutinous 

 matter, so that the copious application of their saliva in the 

 manner of cement, which many authors allege to take place, is 

 I think conjectural. Straws and feathers they pick up in the 

 same manner, that is by alighting, and seldom while on wing. 

 However pleasant it is to have a Swallow's nest in the cor- 

 ner of one's window, to see the birds constantly flying about, 

 and hear their pleasant notes, yet when a whole colony has 

 settled on the house, and the corners of all the windows are 

 occupied with nests, one is apt to consider them rather trouble- 

 some, especially when the panes become crusted with their 

 dung. They may be prevented from building in such places 

 by applying soft soap or tallow to them. ISlr Rennie, who is 

 indignant at some of his " northern neighbours'" for endeavour- 

 ing to banish the INlartins from their windows, asserts " that no 

 sincere lover of nature — nobody who has music in his soul, 

 will be apt to adopt the expedient." Unfortunately for this 

 theory, the only person of my acquaintance who adopted it on a 

 large scale, is one of the most fervent lovers of nature that I 

 know, although, like our " southern neighbours,"" he admires 

 cleanliness, and would be apt to brush away the most beauti- 

 ful cobweb. The greatest patron of the Martins that I have 

 met with is the Earl of Traquair, whose benevolent disposition 

 induces him to extend his protection to all the birds that choose 

 to reside on his domains, where the Blackbirds and Thrushes 

 feast unmolested on the cherries, the Curlews feed on the lawn, 

 and the wild Mallards mingle with the domestic Ducks in the 

 pond. Having with them shared his lordship's hospitality in 

 the autumn of 1839, I counted under the eaves, and in the 

 corners of the windows of Traquair House, an hundred and six 

 nests, all tenanted, besides several that had been deserted, in- 



