BIRDS OF THE WAVE AND WOODLAND 39 



We all notice the first swallow almost as soon as the 

 first cuckoo ; for though the one bird's note catches the ear, 

 the flight of the other arrests the eye as certainly. And 

 what a flight it is ! Has it ever been computed how many 

 hundred miles it flies every day ? For hours they are on the 

 wing, flying at the rate of a mile a minute, and always with 

 exquisite grace. Watch a bird crossing a hay-field, winding 

 in and out of the hay-cocks, rising just sufficiently to clear the 

 hedge at the bottom, wheeling round over the gate, and then 

 up the lane, almost, so it seems, skimming the ground as it 

 goes, and yet without an effort lifting itself up over the 

 spinney, and so dropping back into the hay-field. Their judg- 

 ment is so accurate that they never have to turn at an angle, 

 but, always allowing for the curve beforehand, make their 

 course with a beautifully easy sweep. When there are young 

 ones to feed their speed is even swifter, their industry more 

 untiring, for instead of breaking off in their insect hunting to 

 circle in play with their fellows, or to race the swifts across 

 the sky, they have only the one idea, to fill their beaks as full 

 as they will hold, and hurry back to the nest. 



The swallow does not go back to its young with a single fly 

 at a time, but with a mouth filled as full as possible, so that 

 those who try to calculate the usefulness of this bird by 

 the number of the journeys that it makes to its nest, under- 

 estimate its destruction of insects by probably fifty per 

 cent. Although, perhaps, few who watch the birds know it. 



