The Burgess Bird Book for Children 



for a hole such as he imagined Rattles the King- 

 fisher might make. Instead of one hole he saw 

 a lot of holes, but they were very small holes. 

 He knew right away that Rattles couldn't possibly 

 get in or out of a single one of those holes. In 

 fact, those holes in the bank were no bigger than 

 the holes Downy the Woodpecker makes in trees. 

 Peter couldn't imagine who or what had made 

 them. 



As Peter sat there staring and wondering a trim 

 little head appeared at the entrance to one of 

 those holes. It was a trim little head with a very 

 small bill and a snowy white throat. At first 

 glance Peter thought it was his old friend, Skim- 

 mer the Tree Swallow, and he was just on the 

 point of asking what under the sun Skimmer was 

 doing in such a place as that, when with a lively 

 twitter of greeting the owner of that little home 

 in the bank flew out and circled over Peter's head. 

 It wasn't Skimmer at all. It was Banker the 

 Bank Swallow, own cousin to Skimmer the Tree 

 Swallow. Peter recognized him the instant he 

 got a full view of him. 



In the first place Banker was a little smaller 

 than Skimmer. Then too, he was not nearly so 

 handsome. His back, instead of being that beauti- 

 ful rich steel-blue which makes Skimmer so hand- 

 some, was a sober grayish-brown, He was a 



