XXVIT 
THE SWIFT FAMILY 
(Micropodide) * 
SwiFts are curious birds, with strange habits. 
The one we know by sight in the East is the 
chimney swift. Most lke him in the West is 
Vaux’s swift. His ways are like the common 
chimney swift’s, and his looks nearly the same. 
The Cuimney Swirt is often called the 
chimney swallow, but it is very easy to tell one 
from a swallow. One way is, that when a swift 
is flymg about over our heads, he looks as if 
he had no tail. The tail is very short, not half 
so long as the wing. He looks more like a bat 
than a bird. | 
Then the swift flies in a different way. A 
swallow soars a good deal, that is, moves without 
beating the wings, a sort of gliding through the 
air. But aswift beats the wings much more fre- 
quently. A swallow will often alight on a tele- 
1 See Appendix, 20. 
