SWALLOWS AND SWIFTS 



157 



surface as they fly. House-martins are pure white between 

 the wings and tail. Swifts are dull sooty black all over, 

 except for the faint whitish patch on the throat, which 

 reveals itself when they sweep close past us over the surface 

 of the wide meadows. In the great Alpine swift, which now 

 and then wanders with the common species to this country, 

 the white patch is large and conspicuous, and the plumage 

 is of the colour of a coffee-bean, instead of sooty black. 

 Even our own swift sometimes turns paler towards the end 

 of summer, as its feathers grow worn with creeping into the 

 nest, and bleached by the sun of the dog-days. Loth as 

 swifts are to walk or to settle on any surface from the edge 

 of which they cannot dive easily into the air, they are of 

 course not ' footless,' as their latest scientific name declares 

 with threefold emphasis ; and, contrary to what is often said, 

 they can rise, though awkwardly, from the level ground, 

 unless they have been injured or partly stunned by flying 

 against some obstacle, such as a telegraph wire. Much like 

 an aeroplane, they can move just enough on earth to launch 

 themselves into their proper element. 



