198 THE WHITE-RUMPED (OR WINDOW) SWALLOW. 



of houses, sometimes on the sheltered face of a rock. In Nor- 

 way there is an island rock called Forghattan, with a high 

 tunnel through it, on passing through which hundreds of 

 their nests are seen plastered against the rough roof. Many- 

 build on the perpendicular cliffs of St Abb's Head, and I have 

 seen hundreds of nests, both of white-rumps and red-fronts, in 

 rows, on the face of the cliffs between Auchmithie and the Red- 

 Head in Forfarshire, about 100 feet up (as high as the square 

 tower), undiscemible except for the swallows popping in and 

 out. I have also seen them stuck on the Scaurs at the Witch 

 Lake. When in the corner of a window the opening is always 

 on the sheltered side, looking inwards. The eggs are pure white, 

 oval, about J- of an inch long ; four or five, sometimes six in 

 number. In breeding and during incubation both birds often sit 

 in the nest, and always repose together at night. When nearly 

 fledged, the young come to the edge of the opening to be fed, 

 and when able to fly it is amusing to see the wiles the old birds 

 use to induce them to quit the nest to teach them to fly — often 

 pushing or dragging them out by their bill when clamouring for 

 food, while the old ones cling outside by their claws (a wise 

 lesson for too many human parents !) Touching this, Words- 

 worth — true to Nature, says : — 



" The swallow, at the hour of rest, 

 Peeps often ere she darts into her nest ;" 



for, even when there are only eggs, they will cling 

 lovingly to the nest, peep in and dart away again with a happy 

 twitter, as if to say they are all right ; one more flight. For 

 some days after leaving the nest they fly about, with their 

 parents teaching them, and are fed on the wing, returning to 

 the nest at night, and nestling with the old ones. The first 

 brood fly about the end of June, the second at the end of 

 August or in September ; but the time, like everything else in 

 Nature, varies. In passing the old College Steeple in North 

 Street as late as half -past nine o'clock at night, on the 11th of 

 June 1855, I noted both the old birds sitting in their half- 

 built nest in a corner of one of the janitor's windows ; for the 

 building of birds' nests, like the budding of trees, depends upon 

 the season. I have seen the rooks, like the pear-tree buds, 

 halt, from the 1st of March till the 1st of a blustering, snow- 

 clad April — a whole month — owing to a sudden change of 

 weather. So the swallows : a slight layer of ice on the 

 pond, where they get their clay or mud, on a surly May morn- 

 ing, will delay them for the day. I have watched them begin 



