CHIMNEY SWALLOW- 431 



ed. They were less than those of the pigeon; and the largest 

 of them were like the pinion and tail feathers of the Swallow. 

 I examined carefully this astonishing collection in the hope of 

 finding the bones and bills, but could not distinguish any. The 

 tree with some remains of its ancient companions lying around 

 was of a growth preceding that of the neighbouring forest. 

 Near it and even out of its mouldering ruins grow thrifty 

 trees of a size which indicate two or three .hundred years of 

 age."* 



Such are the usual roosting places of the Chimney Swallow 

 in the more thinly settled parts of the country. In towns, how- 

 ever, they are differently situated, and it is matter of curiosity to 

 observe that they frequently select the court-house chimney for 

 their general place of rendezvous, as being usually more central, 

 and less liable to interruption during the night. I might enu- 

 merate many places where this is their practice. Being in the 

 town of Reading, Pennsylvania, in the month of August, I took 

 notice of sixty or eighty of these birds, a little before evening, 

 amusing themselves by ascending and descending the chimney 

 of the court-house there. I was told that in the early part of 

 summer they were far jmore numerous at that particular spot. 

 On the twentieth of May in returning from an excursion to the 

 Great Pine swamp, I spent part of the day in the town of Eas- 

 ton, where I was informed by my respected friend Mordecai 

 Churchman, cashier of the bank ther,e, and one of the people 

 called quakers, that the Chimney Swallows of Easton had se- 

 lected the like situation; and that from the windows of his house, 

 which stands nearly opposite to the court-house, I might in an 

 hour or two witness their whole manoeuvres. 



I accepted the invitation which pleasure. Accordingly a short 

 time after sun-set the Chimney Swallows, which were gene- 

 rally dispersed about town, began to collect around the court- 

 house, their numbers every moment increasing, till, like motes 

 in the sunbeams, the air seemed full of them. These while they 

 mingled amongst each other seemingly in every direction, ut- 

 * Harris's Journal, p. 180. 



