THE NIGHT-SOARING OF THE SWIFTS. 53 



directions, like distracted spirits, for some time. Then, as the 

 dusk creeps on, you will see them get into order, form them- 

 selves into a flock, and ascend into the sky in wide spirals, 

 screaming all the time. They will disappear from sight 

 several times, but come round again, and at last they will 

 rise so high that they are lost to the sight of the unaided 

 eye, though with a binocular you can see them for some 

 minutes longer. Then the sound ceases, and the stars are out. 



If after watching them up you had sat on a tombstone 

 under the eaves where they build, till half -past ten (with 

 watchers on the other side of the church) to make sure that 

 no bird returned to the nests, and on other nights alone till 

 eleven, you would know each time that they didn't come 

 back to their nests that night. 



At first say till the first of June all the birds go up 

 together, but when the eggs are laid the hen stays at home ; 

 and a male bird may often be seen driving a late -flying hen 

 back to the nest before he goes up with the others. Mr. 

 W. A. Wichell, the author of The Evolution of Bird Song, 

 pointed out the meaning of this performance to me the 

 swoop of the one bird at the other and the escape of the 

 latter, who, however, is always brought back to the nest at 

 last. White of Selborne notices that the hens come out to 

 feed in the evening. I proved this by cutting some of their 

 tails square. 



There is no question that the swifts go up into the air out 

 of sight on a fine night, and that they stay away till the 

 morning ; but what proof is there that they remain on the 

 wing ? 



Though convinced that they do, I cannot prove it, and, 

 though I have watched them up a hundred times, I have 

 never seen them come down again. 



But a farm boy to whom Mr. W. H. Hudson was talking, 

 near Wells, told him that they remained flying about all night, 

 and that he had often seen them rush straight down as if 

 falling from the sky at the same place soon after sunrise, 

 when he was crow-scaring. This is told in " Nature in 



