294 HAMPSHIRE DAYS 



made one or two attempts at watering it, but the labour 

 proved too great to a lazy man, and now Nature had 

 come with her great watering-pot and restored its 

 spring-like verdure and softness. 



During the wettest and coldest days I spent hours 

 watching the swallows and swifts flying about all day 

 long in the rain. These are, indeed, our only summer 

 land birds that never seek a shelter from the wet, and 

 which are not affected in their flight by a wetted plumage. 

 Their upper feathers are probably harder and more closely 

 knit and impervious to moisture than those of other 

 kinds. It may be seen that a swallow or swift, when 

 flying about in the rain, at short intervals gives himself 

 a quick shake as if to throw off the raindrops. Then, 

 too, the food and constant exercise probably serve to 

 keep them warmer than they would be sitting motion- 

 less in a dry place. Swifts, we sometimes see, are 

 numbed, and even perish of cold during frosty nights in 

 spring; I doubt that the cold ever kills them by day 

 when they can keep perpetually moving. 



Day by day, during this long spell of summer wet 

 and cold, these birds diminished in number, until they 

 were almost all gone swifts, swallows, and house- 

 martins ; but we were not to be without a swallow, for 

 as these went, sand-martins came in, and increased in 

 numbers until they were in thousands. We had them 

 every day and all day before us, flying up and down the 

 valley, in the shelter of the woods, their pale plumage 

 and wavering flight making them look in the distance 



