SWIFTS, SWALLOWS AND MARTINS 



twittering broods in roofless nests. No doubt 

 the birds realised that they had nothing to 

 fear from rain, and were reluctant to waste 

 time and labour in covering their homes with 

 unnecessary roofs. 



Most birds are careful in the education of 

 their young, and indeed thorough training at 

 an early stage must be essential in the case of 

 creatures that are left to protect themselves 

 and to find their own food when only a few 

 weeks old. Fortunately they develop with a 

 rapidity that puts man and other mammals 

 to shame, and the helpless bald little swift 

 lying agape in the nest will hi another fort- 

 night be able to fly across Europe. One of 

 the most favoured observers of the early 

 teaching given by the mother-swallow to her 

 brood was an angler who told me how, one 

 evening when he was fishing in some ponds at 

 no great distance from London, a number of 

 baby swallows alighted on his rod. He kept 

 as still as possible, fearful of alarming his 

 interesting visitors, but he must at last have 

 moved, for, with one accord, they all fell off 

 his rod together skimmed over the surface 

 of the water and disappeared in the direction 

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