8l8 PATAGONIAN EXPEDITIONS I ZOOLOGY. 



tinue to feed them many days. . . . When flying, these Swallows glide 

 along very close to the earth, and when weary settle down (contrary to the 

 custom of other swallows) and rest on the level grassy plains. Like other 

 birds of this family they possess the habit of gliding to and fro before a 

 rider's horse to snatch up the little twilight moths startled from the grass. 

 Seldom does a person ride on the pampas in summer without having a 

 number of Swallows gather round him ; often I have thought that more 

 than a hundred were before my horse at one time ; but, from the rapidity 

 of their motions, it is impossible to count them. 



"When the season of migration approaches, they begin to congregate in 

 parties not very large (though sometimes as many as one or two hundred 

 individuals are seen together) ; these companies spend much of their time 

 perched close together on weeds, low trees, fences, or other slightly ele- 

 vated situations, and pay very little attention to a person approaching, but 

 seem preoccupied or preyed upon by some anxiety that has no visible 

 cause. 



" This time immediately preceding the departure of the Swallows is indeed 

 a season of deep interest to the observer of nature. The birds seem to 

 forget their songs and aerial recreations ; the attachment of the sexes, the 

 remembrance of the spring is obliterated ; they already begin to feel the 

 premonitions of that marvellous instinct that urges them hence : not yet 

 an irresistible impulse, it is a vague sense of disquiet; but its influence is 

 manifest in their language and gestures, their wild manner of flight, and 

 listless intervals. The little Atticora cyanoleiica disappears immediately 

 after the other, larger species. Many stragglers continue to be seen after 

 the departure of the main body; but before the middle of March not one 

 remains, the migration of this species being very regular." (P. Z. S. 1872, 

 pp. 844-846.) 



Family Troglodytid^. 



Sharpe, Cat. Birds, Brit. Mus. vi. p. 180 (1881); Hand List Birds, iv. p. 71 

 (1903)- 



Genus TROGLODYTES Vieillot. 



Type. 



TroglodytesV\€\\\o\., Ois. Amer. Sept., 1807 (1809 ?), 52. 



Troglodytes aedott. 



