14 THE LIFE OF A. BIRD. 



About five or six feet down the inside of a wide, 

 circular chimney at Cowie distillery, about five 

 miles from Stirling, for some time past, three or 

 four pairs of swallows have annually built their 

 nests. Upon the inside of the roof of the coolers 

 at the same place, which is 250 feet long by 

 50 in breadth, upwards of a hundred pairs of 

 them for many years have erected their ha- 

 bitations and reared their offspring. A more 

 singular situation still is also recorded. In the 

 inside of the large wooden vane of Bridgehaugh 

 Mill, Berwickshire, for fourteen successive years 

 a pair took up their residence. The original 

 nest is still remaining. Upon it, during that 

 long period, there have been only two other 

 nests built, which are ranged one above another, 

 and formed of mud and straw. For several 

 seasons the young of this devoted pair were 

 smothered with the smoke of a fire which is 

 kindled during summer for the purpose of drying 

 the corn. At length the pair quitted their habi- 

 tation, and built another upon the side of the 

 wall at no great distance from it. In a house 

 which was for some time unoccupied, and the 

 door of which was left slightly ajar for the 



