356 SWALLOWS WINTER UNDER WATER. 



they have chirped about a little, or, as we say, sung their 

 swallow-song, they fly in flocks together, and plunge them- 

 selves down in fresh-water lakes, commonly amongst reeds 

 and bushes ; whence, in the spring, they come forth again, 

 and take possession of their former dwellings. Our fisher- 

 men, in the winter, sometimes by accident fall upon whole 

 flocks of swallows in this state, and bring them up by scores, 

 and even by hundreds ; they find them coupled two and 

 two together, with their legs entangled and bills stuck in 

 one another ; and they appear altogether like a strange mass. 

 If at such times they are brought into a warm room, they 

 will begin to move in half an hour, and in a little while 

 will flutter and fly about ; yet this untimely and unnatural 

 reviving does not last longer than an hour at most, and 

 then they entirely die." 



Even Nilsson though nominally repudiating this fable in 

 the last edition of his valuable work, published in 1836, 

 would not seem to have the crotchet entirely out of his 

 head. " The swallow," he says, " seldom returns to Scania 

 until some time after the lakes and rivers are open ; but in 

 the more northern parts of Sweden it appears for the most 

 part immediately after the breaking up of the ice, or perhaps 

 somewhat previously. From this cause it may readily happen 

 that a straggling swallow might have fallen into a vak, or 

 aperture in the ice, and have been fished up by the ice-net. 

 Such a frozen swallow might possibly have quickened on being 

 brought into a warm room." Elsewhere the Professor says : 

 " If any one be an eye-witness to, and have certain know- 

 ledge of the fact (that of the swallow hibernating in the 

 water), I hope and request he will lay all the particulars, 

 minutely detailed, before naturalists. Until this happens, 1 



