LETTER LI I. 



To the same. 



SELBORNE, Sept. tyh, 1781. 



HAVE just met with a circumstance respect- 

 ing swifts, which furnishes an exception to 

 the whole tenor of my observations ever since 

 I have bestowed any attention on that species 

 of hirundines. Our swifts, in general, with- 

 drew this year about the first day of August, 

 all save one pair, which in two or three days 

 was reduced to a single bird. The perseverance of this in- 

 dividual made me suspect that the strongest of motives, that 

 of an attachment to her young, could alone occasion so late a 

 stay. I watched therefore till the 24th of August, and then 



