THE SWIFTS FLIGHT 243 



the summer season in that portion of the sky visible 

 from my front windows on the first and second floors 

 of the house I inhabit. And from the time of my 

 first peep at the sky at six or seven o'clock in the 

 morning until I light my reading lamp at nine in 

 the evening, they are to be seen rushing madly 

 through the air at an average speed of about a 

 hundred miles an hour, thus covering ten to fifteen 

 hundred miles during those hours; but I don't know 

 how early they begin, nor how late they leave off. 

 And at this same rate, without resting by day, they 

 will spend the summer, and probably the eight 

 remaining months of the year in distant South 

 Africa. When I look at them they are always madly 

 chasing each other, now all close together, now in 

 a long train, describing an immense circle, a wheel 

 set obliquely to the earth, the long narrow scythe- 

 shaped wings all but touching the eaves and walls 

 above my window when they are lowest down, then 

 off and away and up to the sky again. Then after 

 a dozen or more times of circling, they gather in a 

 bunch and float for a few seconds, then scatter 

 suddenly to the four winds of heaven and vanish 

 from sight, to reappear and re-form in a few minutes 

 and re-start the living wheel on its everlasting 

 rotations. 



And even as the lower animals thus excel us in 

 physical power and speed and endurance, so do they 

 surpass us in beauty of form and colouring, grace 

 of motion, and in melody. But as to the last point 

 much explanation is necessary. 



