104 



descended into their watery sepulchre. Swallows are 

 known to appear earlier and depart later in southern 

 than in northern Britain. Mr. Forster observes, " it is 

 hardly to be supposed that they would assemble to- 

 gether merely to hide themselves." * Adanson states, 

 that on the 6th of October, on the African coast, four 

 swallows alighted on the rigging now the hirundo 

 rustica, or common house-swallow, leaves Britain 

 about this time; and the same naturalist tells us, that 

 these birds do not build nests there as in Europe, but 

 roost every night on the ^lands on the shore, nor do 

 they appear in Senegal until after their disappearance 

 in Europe. Sir Charles Wager informs us that in one 

 of his voyages homeward an immense flock of swallows 

 settled on the ship. Every rope was covered with 

 them, and they clung to one another like a swarm of 

 bees. " We find," says Sir William Jardine, " tor- 

 pidity occurring among animals, fishes, the amphibiae, 

 and reptiles, and among insects, but we have never 

 found any authenticated instance of this provision 

 among birds. Their frames are adapted to a more 

 extensive locomotive power." The annual migration 

 of birds seems to be more general in North America 

 than in Europe from the greater inclemency. 



The calendar of return in the stork, or the cuckoo, 

 or swallow, is not founded either in solar or sidereal 

 time, its date seems based in meteorology : sometimes 

 the appearance is earlier and sometimes later in the 

 season; but " intelligent of seasons," this period always 

 harmonizes with a certain fixity in the weather it is 

 a point on which no mistake is made ; they " know 

 their appointed time." What vision in foreign lands 

 has communicated to our aerial voyageurs that the va- 



" Brumal Retreat of the Swallow," London, 1813, p. 17. 



