The 18th of April will generally be marked by the appearance of the Martin if it is not 
in evidence a day or two earlier, but, alas, it visits us in far smaller numbers than formerly, 
No sooner does the weather become genial than the birds visit their old nests, returning 
season after season to the same spot with the greatest regularity and pertinacity, and at once 
commence the necessary repairs or reconstruction. Though by nature a cliff builder, the 
Martin for the most part selects the sheltering eave of a dwelling-house, frequently in 
busy towns, for its nesting site, and there it constructs of mud and straw its semi-spherical 
abode, the back and perhaps the top being formed by the wall and eaves of the house, 
and only a small hole being left for ingress and egress. As the bird is very sociable in 
its habits, several nests are often erected round the same house, and occasionally quite 
a row of these singular habitations are seen side by side. Occasionally, I fear too often, 
the labour is all in vain, and, when complete, the nest is taken possession of by the 
marauding sparrow ; the decrease of Martins of late years is attributed by some partly to 
this cause. It is interesting to see these elegant birds collecting mud to form their nests 
from any damp place by the wayside, and in continued droughts they will follow the water- 
carts, collecting the moistened soil from the little pools left on the roads. Both birds work 
at the structure, to which they cling in succession by claws and tail, each one in turn laying 
its little brick; a few dried grasses and a warm lining of feathers complete the structure. 
The eggs are pure translucent white, and number four or five. 
_ Inthe evening “The sitting bird leaves her nest for a while to stretch her weary limbs 
and join with her mate the twittering throng. Now, mingling in full chorus, they swarm 
over our heads ; now, separating in all directions, they skim over the trees and housetops, 
rising and falling under the eaves of our dwellings; and, again collecting, repeat their varied 
movements, till, almost imperceptibly, when the sun has set and the deepening shadows are 
stealing over the scene, they drop off by degrees to their respective homes, and the stillness 
of the summer night succeeds in strange contrast to their busy actious.” * 
When the young are hatched, the quantity of noxious insects destroyed by these useful 
birds, large at all times, is immensely increased. Macgillivray, who was an excellent observer, 
states that in the middle of July a pair of these birds visited their young ones with food 
three hundred and seven times in one day, between the hours of four a.m. and eight p.m., 
making at certain parts of the day twenty-eight visits per hour, and as they rear two broods, 
the services each pair render must be inestimable. 
As the season advances the young birds congregate and take their departure, leaving 
the old ones and the late broods to follow. Not unfrequently the late broods are found 
dead in the nest; whether they have been deserted by their parents, whose migratory 
impulse has been too strong to allow them to remain, or whether they have perished from 
scarcity of food is uncertain, but I am inclined to adopt the latter belief, and by the 
middle of October the resident birds have, as a rule, disappeared. But even then we have 
not seen the last of the Martins, for during November and even into December, should 
the season be open, flocks of passing migrants on their way from still more northerly 
* “ Birds of Norfolk.” Vol. I., page 335, 
