OF SOUTHERN AUSTRALIA. 35 



sions, and in the number to a clutch from four to two. Of 

 twelve nests observed, three contained four eggs, six three 

 eggs, three two eggs — all well incubated. 



The nests, though slight in structure, are generally faith- 

 fully built of rootlets or grasses, or more often twigs and 

 grasses, and in many cases they are artistically arranged. 

 They are seldom above 6 feet from the ground, and placed in 

 all manner of positions, preference being given to perpen- 

 dicular shght stems, though nearly as often I have found 

 them placed upon the horizontal firm twigs or branchlets of 

 shrubs and bushes. One nest was placed in the socket for a 

 paddock slip-panel, a second in a furze or whin hedge, many 

 in bushes of the same or in Leptospermum, others in acacia 

 wattles, and fewer in eucalypts. 



That these two species of Wood-Swallow visited the south 

 in considerable numbers may be deduced from the fact that 

 40 nests — building, tenanted, and vacated — were observed by 

 the writer on the 16th December within a mile's walk, and 

 nearly within a narrow straight line. Two orchards, a belt of 

 furze or whin, and an almost dry watercourse had to be 

 passed by. Within a given area the nests were placed in the 

 orchards more numerously than in the legume whin. Plum, 

 pear, apple, and cherry trees in particular received the nesting 

 honours. One nest was placed 2 feet above the ground in a 

 sweetbriar in the township of Surrey Hills. My chord of 

 generosity was somehow struck, so I placed a piece of basalt 

 in the nest in order that the birds would be saved more 

 serious disaster later on. Next week the nest was gone, and 

 a hke fate would have awaited the eggs but for the kindly 

 intervention which caused the birds to build elsewhere. 



Both the male and female birds appear to sit. 



Generally this bird might be regarded as most sensitive to 

 outside interference. Yet in isolated instances it possesses a 

 wonderful hardihood and persistence in following out an idea, 



