A RAILWAY COLONY. 197 



paratively but little known ; while the other two, the Chimnej'- 

 Swallow and the House-Martin, are very generally confounded 

 with each other. It will not be out of place therefore to say a 

 few words here by way of pointing out to the non-ornithological 

 reader the distinctive marks of these most familiar of our fea- 

 thered friends which come to us from afar with every returning 

 summer. 



Our first visitor is the Swallow (Hirundo rustica), which gene- 

 rally makes its appearance just before the middle of April, pre- 

 ceding the other members of the tribe by a few days. As its 

 name implies, it is somewhat of a rustic in its habits, and seldom 

 ventures to take up its residence in the immediate vicinity of 

 large towns. The Martin (Plirundo urbica), on the other hand, 

 is quite a town dweller, constantly haunting the busiest tho- 

 roughfares of our largest cities, and is almost as familiar in Cheap- 

 side and Fleet Street as the Sparrows themselves. It is not in- 

 sensible, however, to the quiet and the purer atmosphere of the 

 country, and is even there much more commonly seen than the 

 Swallow, for which it is mistaken. There is no difficulty in dis- 

 tinguishing the two birds even on the wing, the Martin being at 

 once recognizable by the snowy white of its throat and breast, and 

 by the conspicuous patch, of the same colour on the back at the 

 base of the tail. The distinctive marks of the Swallow are its 

 forked tail and the patches of rusty red on its forehead, chin, 

 and throat. 



Another point of distinction between the two birds is the 

 place selected for nesting ; the Swallow invariably building in 

 chimneys or against the rafters of bams and out-houses, while 

 the Martin constructs its nest under the caves of houses, the sills 

 of windows, and other similar situations. The boldness and pre- 

 suming confidence of the Martin in selecting exposed and easily 

 accessible situations for its nest has often been noticed ; but we 

 never met with a more remarkable instance of this sort of 

 daring than is displayed by a colony of these birds which, year 

 after year, attach their nests to the pillars that support the roof 

 of the railway station at Worthing. It is a long row of slender 

 iron pillars, about eight or ten feet high, and scarcely more than 

 a yard distant from the rails on which trains are continually 

 passing, and yet almost every pillar in the row has a nest on 

 each side of it, the nests being supported in some cases by pro- 



