BIRDS OF PEASEMARSH 



Now, except in distant parts, the lonely 

 woods and the caves have been taken from 

 them and the streams and lakes are no longer 

 safe and silent. The birds must either follow 

 the retreating woods farther and farther back, 

 or nest near the homes of man. Many of them 

 did not require three hundred years to adapt 

 themselves to the changed condition and the 

 surroundings of the white man. They gave 

 him their confidence when he first came among 

 them and where that confidence has not been 

 abused the birds have made their homes for 

 years. 



One of the first birds to leave its native 

 haunts and come to the habitation of man was 

 the Chimney Swift. There is great danger 

 that it may be one of the first to disappear. 

 For most people it has already become but a 

 memory. For some it is not even a memory, 

 but only a romance as unreal as the tales of 

 elves and fairies. For some, however, it is still 

 more than a romance and more than a 

 the chimney as surely as the coming of spring, 

 memory, it is a real living being that returns to 

 Those rare ones are they who have remained 

 in some old home, with its weather-beaten 



[22] 



