A BUNCH OF BRIGHT BIRDS 273 



hobby-rider is sometimes in the saddle unwit- 

 tingly) and caught sight of a few swifts far over- 

 head. People were passing, but it was now or 

 never with me, and I whipped out my opera-glass. 

 There were six of the birds, and their throats were 

 white. So much I saw, having known what to 

 look for, and then they were gone, as if the 

 heavens had opened and swallowed them up. It 

 was a niggardly interview, at pretty long range, 

 but a deal better than nothing ; enough, at all 

 events, for an identification. They were white- 

 throated swifts, Aeronautes melanoleucus. 



Three days later a flock of at least seventeen 

 birds of the same species were hawking over the 

 Santa Cruz Valley, and now, as they swept this 

 way and that at their feeding, there was leisure 

 for the field-glass and something like a real ex- 

 amination. To my surprise (surprise is the com- 

 pensation of ignorance) I discovered that they 

 had not only white throats, as their name implies, 

 but white breasts, and more noticeable still, white 

 rumps. Those who are familiar with our common 

 dingy, soot-colored chimney swift of the East will 

 be able to form some idea of the distinguished 

 appearance of this Westerner: a considerably 

 larger bird, built on the same rakish lines, shoot- 

 ing about the sky in the same lightning-like zig- 

 zags, and marked in this striking and original 



