Coues 07i the Eave, Cliff, or Crescent Swallow. Ill 



and refreshment, when the Swallows swarm about promiscuously 

 a fly-catching. In an incredibly short time the basement of the 

 nest is laid, and the whole form becomes clearly outlined ; the mud 

 dries quickly, and there is a standing-place. This is soon occupied 

 by one of the pair, probably the female, who now stays at home to 

 welcome her mate with redoubled cries of joy and ecstatic quivering 

 of the wings, as he brings fresh pellets, which the pair in the closest 

 consultation dispose to their entire satisfaction. In three or four 

 days, perhaps, the deed is done ; the house is built, and nothing 

 remains but to furnish it. The poultry-yard is visited, and laid 

 \mder contribution of feathers ; hay, leaves, rags, paper, string — 

 Swallows are not very particular — may be added ; and then the 

 female does the rest of the " furnishing " by her own particular self. 

 Not impossibly, just at this period, a man comes with a pole, and 

 demolishes the whole affair ; or the enfant terrible of the premises 

 appears, and removes the eggs to enrich his sanded tray of like 

 treasures ; or a tom-cat reaches for his supper. But more probably 

 matters are so propitious that in due season the nest decants a full 

 brood of Swallows, — and I wish that nothing more harmful ever 

 came out of the bottle. 



Seeing how these birds work the mud in their mouths, some 

 have supposed that the nests are agglutinated, to some extent at 

 least, by the saliva of the birds. It is far from an unreasonable 

 idea, — the Chimney-Swift sticks her bits of twigs together, and 

 glues the frail cup to the wall with viscid saliva ; and some of the 

 Old World Swifts build nests of gummy spittle, which cakes on dry- 

 ing, not unlike gelatine. Undoubtedly some saliva is mingled with 

 the natural moisture of the mud ; but the readiness with which 

 these Swallows' nests crumble on drying shows that saliva enters 

 slightly into their composition, — practically not at all, — and that 

 this fluid possesses no special viscosity. Much more probably, the 

 moisture of the birds' mouths helps to soften and temper the pellets, 

 rather than to agglutinate the dried edifice itself. 



In various parts of the West, especially along the Missouri and 

 the Colorado, where I have never failed to find clustering nests of 

 the Cliff Swallow, I have occasionally witnessed some curious asso- 

 ciates of these birds. In some of the navigable canons of the Colo- 

 rado I have seen the bulky nests of the Great Blue Heron on flat 

 ledges of rock, the faces of which were stuccoed with Swallow-nests. 

 How these frolicsome creatures must have swarmed around the 



