100 GRAY LADY AND THE BIRDS 
bugs, and, in return for their services in destroying vast numbers 
of noxious insects, ask only for harbourage and protection. It is 
to the fact that they capture their prey on the wing that their 
peculiar value to the cotton grower is due. Orioles do royal 
service in catching weevils on the bolls; and Blackbirds, Wrens, 
Flycatchers, and others contribute to the good work; but when 
Swallows are migrating over the cotton-fields they find the 
weevils flying in the open and wage active war against them. 
—H. W. Hensuaw, B.B.S., in Value of Swallows as Insect 
Destroyers. 
“That Wise Man didn’t say anything about Chimney 
Swallows, and, please, Gray Lady, you left them out, too,” 
said Sarah Barnes, the moment the scrap-book closed, 
“and I know they catch lots of flying bugs.” 
“Ah, Sarah!” exclaimed Gray Lady, laughing, “TI did 
not precisely forget, but I was waiting for some one of you 
to ask the question. The bird that is called the Chimney 
Swallow even exceeds the others in being forever on the 
wing and never perching or ‘sitting down,’ as Sarah calls 
it, and it is a brave insect destroyer. In fact, it never 
perches even for one moment, but when it does rest makes 
a sort of bracket of its sharply pointed tail-feathers and 
rests against a tree or inside the chimney, somewhat as a 
Woodpecker does when resting on an upright tree-trunk. 
The Woodpeckers, however, have very strong feet, and the 
feet of the Chimney Swallow are very weak. But here 
comes the funny part — this chimney bird isn’t a Swallow, 
and the Swallows would call him a changeling. He is a 
Swift, first cousin to the tiny Humming-bird and the 
mysterious Night Hawk and Whip-poor-Will, so we must 
leave his story until we come to that of the family where 
he belongs, for after we have learned the names of individ- 
