THE SCREECHER 185 



claims many victims from their impetuous energy. 

 More than once we have picked up the dead bodies of 

 swifts who have dashed themselves to pieces in their 

 headlong flight. 



A story is told by a naturalist of how he wished to 

 procure a swift for scientific examination. While he 

 was selecting a bird, from a wheeling pack, to be a 

 martyr to science, and was about to shoot, two of the 

 others, flying from opposite directions, met, head on, 

 and with such force that one dropped dead, thus 

 allowing the naturalist to take a dead swift in hand 

 without deliberately taking life. 



Swifts suffer much from cold when it greets them 

 on their arrival in this country, and if there should be a 

 cold spell in August, it is sure to take heavy toll. A 

 very wet spring may mean that their eggs do not 

 hatch ; others in that case would be laid, and perhaps 

 through being hatched late the young birds cannot 

 thrive. On these and other accounts we do not find 

 an increase in the numbers of our swifts rather, alas, 

 a decrease. 



J\ Heaven-sent Dish of Turnips 



" One of my neighbours shot a ring-dove [or wood-pigeon] on an 

 evening as it was returning from feed and going to roost. When 

 his wife had picked and drawn it, she found its craw [or crop] stuffed 

 with the most nice and tender tops of turnips. These she washed 

 and boiled, and so sat down to a choice and delicate plate of greens, 

 culled and provided in this extraordinary manner." 



