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BARN SWALLOW. 415 



tary and very suspicious reports of a Mr. Somebody having 

 made a discovery of this kind? If caves were their places of 

 winter retreat, perhaps no country on earth could supply them 

 with a greater choice. I have myself explored many of these 

 in various parts of the United States both in winter and in spring, 

 particularly in that singular tract of country in Kentucky, call- 

 ed the Barrens, where some of these subterraneous caverns 

 are several miles in length, lofty and capacious, and pass under 

 a large and deep river have conversed with the saltpetre 

 workers by whom they are tenanted j but never heard or met 

 with one instance of a Swallow having been found there in 

 winter. These people treated such reports with ridicule. 



It is to be regretted that a greater number of experiments 

 have not been made, by keeping live Swallows through the win- 

 ter, to convince these believers in the torpidity of birds, of their 

 mistake. That class of cold-blooded animals which are known 

 to become torpid during winter, and of which hundreds and 

 thousands are found every season, are subject to the same when 

 kept in a suitable room for experiment. How is it with the 

 Swallows in this respect? Much powerful testimony might be 

 produced on this point; the following experiments recently 

 made by Mr. James Pearson of London, and communicated 

 by Sir John Trevelyn, Bart, to Mr. Bewick, the celebrated en- 

 graver in wood, will be sufficient for our present purpose, and 

 throw great light on this part of the subject.* 



"Five or six of these birds were taken about the latter end 

 of August, 1784, in a bat fowling net at night; they were put 

 separately into small cages, and fed with nightingale's food: in 

 about a week or ten days they took food of themselves; they 

 were then put altogether into a deep cage, four feet long, with 

 gravel at the bottom ; a broad shallow pan with water was placed 

 in it, in which they sometimes washed themselves, and seemed 

 much strengthened by it. One day Mr. Pearson observed that 

 they went into the water with unusual eagerness, hurrying in 

 and out again repeatedly with such swiftness as if they had been 

 * See Bewick's British Birds, vol. i, p. 254. 



