August 
artificial means of exhilaration, with the delight- 
ful possibilities and monotonous impossibilities 
of every sleepy old country town, I often found 
myself on the banks of a winding, elm-shaded 
river—one of those streamlets whose restful, 
constant flow is a most alluring invitation to 
the most intense laziness. A flock of bank 
swallows visited the spot quite as often as my- 
self, and from more practical and urgent mo- 
tives; and, concluding that they lived in the 
neighborhood, I one day followed up the stream 
to a point where the banks rose high and sandy 
from the water’s edge. Here, I thought, if I 
knew anything of the domiciliary tastes of bank 
swallows, would be a most eligible site for their 
residence ; and jumping down to the river’s 
edge, and casting my eye along the steep, sandy 
wall, I soon discovered a large number of their 
excavations in the hard, fine sand—clean, round 
holes, looking at a distance as if a number of 
cannon-balls had been shot into the bank from 
the opposite shore. They were just large enough 
to admit my hand, and so deep that I could in 
many cases thrust in my arm up to the shoulder, 
and with my fingers just touch the end, where 
the excavation became a little larger. As the 
young had already been hatched and the abodes 
227 
