120 STUDIES IN LIFE AND SENSE. 



No consideration of the latter nature, for instance, would satis- 

 factorily explain why swallows or swifts should leave the genial climate 

 of Northern Africa for the less genial north, at a period when their 

 insect food is as plentiful, if not more abundant, at home than in 

 Europe. The ruby-throat, one of the prettiest and smallest of the 

 humming-birds, flies annually from Mexico to Newfoundland, as a 

 summer migrant to the south. It thus apparently exchanges a land 

 of plenty for a comparatively unsatisfying Egypt, and in its extensive 

 flight certainly passes over lands better suited for its support than 

 the terminal area in which it rests. One of the most interesting 

 points in connection with the migration of birds naturally consists in 

 the determination of the rate or speed at which the migrants fly. 

 On the whole, surprising results may be said to follow the most 

 cursory inquiry into this subject. The common swift is said to wing 

 its flight at the rate of some 275 miles per hour; a speed which, if 

 maintained for six or seven hours, would suffice to transport it from 

 its summer to its winter quarters, or vice versa. The speed of the 

 swallow is said to average ninety miles per hour, and the famous pas- 

 senger pigeon of America can make its thousand miles per day with 

 ease. Of this latter bird it is recorded that pigeons have been killed 

 near New York having their crops filled with rice, the nearest rice- 

 fields to New York being those of Carolina and Georgia. These 

 fields are distant between 300 and 400 miles, and as digestion is 

 tolerably rapid in the pigeons, six hours may be regarded as a fair 

 average period for food to leave the crop. Within six hours, it may 

 therefore be calculated, these birds must have flown the distance 

 between New York and the rice-fields, the rate of speed being equal 

 to that of an express train. 



The carrier-pigeons are equally notable for their speed, and for 

 the unerring accuracy with which they return to their haunts : this 

 latter faculty being apparently a special modification of that whereby 

 migrants return to their summer and winter quarters, and depending, 

 firstly, upon a knowledge of landmarks or some mysterious " flight- 

 faculty ; " and, secondly, upon the faculty of memory and locality. 

 A carrier-pigeon has been known to fly from Rouen to Ghent a 

 distance, "as the crow flies," of 150 miles in an hour and a half. 

 Recently a pigeon flown from the window of the Continental mail 

 train as it left Dover pier, was found in its home in the City long 

 before the arrival of the train in London. From the " Country " we 

 extract the following details of a remarkable pigeon-flight from 

 Reading, Berkshire, to Brussels, a distance of 238 miles. In 

 July 1878, Mr. Barker, of Brussels, sent to Reading some young 

 pigeons, accompanied by five adults, the latter being intended to fly 

 back to Belgium. The birds arrived in Reading at midday on 

 Thursday, the 25th of July, and were duly inspected by many of the 



