love's meinie. 43 



scarcely, as far as I knoM', definite notice even of the rate 

 of fljo-ht. "Wliat do you suppose it is? AV^e are apt to 

 tliiiik of the migration of a swallow, as we should our- 

 selves of a serious journey. How long, do you thiidv, it 

 would take him, if he flew uninterruptedly, to get from 

 here to Africa ? 



48. Michelet gives the rate of his fliglit (at full speed, 

 of course,) as eighty leagues an hour. I find no luore 

 sound authority ; but do not doubt his approximate 

 accuracy; * still how curious and how provoking it is that 

 neither White of Selborne, Bewick, Yarrell, nor Gould, 

 says a word about this, one should have thought the most 

 interesting, power of the bird.f 



Taking Michelet's estimate — eighty French leagues, 

 roughly two hundred and fifty miles, an hour — we have a 

 thousand miles in four' hours. That is to say, leaving 

 Devonshire after an earl}' breakfast, he could be in Africa 

 to lunch. 



49. He could, I say, if his flight were constant; l>ut 

 though there is much inconsistency in the accounts, the 

 sum of testimony seems definite that the swallow is among 

 the most fatiguable of birds. " When the M'eather is 



* I wrote this some time ago, and the endeavour I have since made 

 to verify statements on points of natural histoiy which I had taken on 

 trust have given me reason to doubt everybody's accuracy. The 

 ordinary flight of the swallow does not, assuredly, even in the dashes, 

 reach anything like this speed. 



f Incidentally suggestive sentences occur in the history of Selborne, 

 but its author never comes to the point, in this case. 



