282 



PASSERES. BIRDS. CYPSELID.E. 



nest till the end of July. During all this period the 

 parents attend to and feed thetn with great care, supply- 

 ing them with abundance of food, although they allow 

 rather longer intervals to elapse between their visits to 

 the nest, than is usual with birds when bringing up 

 their young. After the young birds have come out, 

 they receive little attention from their parents, but 

 are left pretty much to shift for themselves ; this, how- 

 ever, they are well able to do, and, indeed, within a 

 very short time after their first initiation into the cares 

 and perils of the outer world, they are strong enough 

 to undertake a long journey into unknown regions. It 

 sometimes happens that the first eggs are destroyed by 

 some accident; and in this case, the Swifts lay a second 

 time. Some curious examples of this have been re- 

 corded. Gilbert White, writing in 1781, says" Our 

 swifts in general withdrew this year about the first day 

 of August all save one pair, which, in two or three 

 days, was reduced to a single bird. The perseverance 

 of this individual made me suspect that the strongest 

 of motives, that of an attachment to her young, could 

 alone occasion so late a stay. I watched, therefore, 

 till the twenty-fourth of August, and then discovered 

 that, under the eaves of the church, she attended upon 

 two young which were fledged, and now put out their 

 white chins from a crevice. These remained till the 

 twenty-seventh, looking more alert every day, and 

 seeming to long to be on the wing. After this day 

 they were missing at once ; nor could I ever observe 

 them with their dam coursing round the church, in the 

 act of learning to fly, as the first broods evidently do. 

 On the thirty-first, I caused the eaves to be searched ; 

 but we found only two callow dead swifts, on which a 

 second nest had been formed." In this instance, it is 

 evident that by some accident the first brood had been 

 destroyed, that a second nest had been made over them, 

 and a second brood produced ; that th male, yielding to 

 the strong impulse to migration, coolly took his depar- 

 ture, leaving the cares of the family to his mate ; and 

 that the latter, faithfully discharging the duty thus 

 imposed upon her, remained for nearly a month, after 

 the main body of her species had started on their 

 journey southward. 



In another case recorded by Mr. Salmon in the 

 Magazine rf Natural Hi-story, the male bird behaved 

 in a manner more consistent with his duty, and remained 

 to share with his partner in the trouble of rearing their 

 little family. In this instance also his forbearance was 

 far more severely tried than it could have been in 

 that observed by White, for on the second of Septem- 

 ber the young birds found in the nest did not seem to 

 be more than a week old, and it was not until the first 

 of October that they were ready to fly; three days 

 afterwards the whole family disappeared. Single speci- 

 mens, probably detained much in the same way as 

 those just mentioned, have been met with even later in 

 the season in various parts of this country ; thus Mr. 

 Blackwall records his having seen one on the 20th 

 October; one was seen in Perthshire on the 8th Novem- 

 ber, 1834; and another in Devonshire in 1835, as late 

 as the 27th November. 



THE ALPINE SWIFT (Cypscltts melba), also called 

 the WHiTE-BEi,LiEr> SWIFT, is recorded as a second 



British species, some half a dozen specimens having 

 been killed at different times in this country. Its true 

 European home, however, is amongst the Swiss Alps 

 and other high mountain ranges of the South of Europe : 

 it ranges eastward through Greece and Turkey into 

 Asia, where it has even been met with in India, and in 

 Africa it migrates southwards to the vicinity of the 

 Cape of Good Hope. Its coloration is very different 

 from that of the Common Swift. The whole of the 

 upper surface is of a greyish-brown colour, as are also 

 a band round the neck, the thighs, chest, and unc'er 

 tail-coverts ; the chin and throat, the lower parts of the 

 chest and the belly are white. The length, to the 

 extremity of the tail, is from eight to nine inches, and 

 the expanse of the wings about twenty or twenty-one, 

 so that in this respect it exceeds even the Common 

 Swift. The rapidity of its flight is also described as 

 greater than that of the preceding species, with which 

 it agrees in its general habits. 



THE WHITE-RUMPED SWIFT (Cypsehis affinis) is 

 a common species in India, where it is very generally 

 distributed. It is called the Ababeel by the Hindoos. 

 It haunts pagodas, choultries, and other buildings, and 

 makes its nest which is composed of straw, grass, 

 feathers, and other soft substances, mingled with clay 

 in the numerous crevices with which these edi- 

 fices usually abound. The nests are usually built 

 close together, but so as to be concealed wholly or 

 partially by a beam, rafter, or some similar object lying 

 before them. 



THE BATASSIAN SWIFT (Cypselus batassiensis), 

 another abundant Indian species, is said by Dr. Bu- 

 chanan Hamilton, to be " a nocturnal bird, appearing 

 at sunset, and going to rest at sunrise." According to 

 the same authority, its Bengalee name, Batassia, " sig- 

 nifies a bird resembling wind, and is bestowed on this 

 species on account of its swift flight." It frequents the 

 groves of palms, especially those of the Palmyra or Tal 

 (Borassusflabelliformis), on the fan-like fronds of which 

 it builds its nests. These little birds are sociable in their 

 habits, as many as twenty or thirty pairs being often 

 met with upon a single palm-tree ; and they also live in 

 great harmony with their feathered neighbours of other 

 species, for Mr. Blyth states, that it is " rare to meet 

 with one of the same palms clustered with the pensile 

 nests of the Baya (Ploceus philippensis), that does not 

 also harbour two or three pairs of this elegant little 

 Palm Swift." 



THE JAMAICA PALM SWIFT (Cypsflus phcenico- 

 bhts), regarded by M. Gosse, its first describer, as the 

 type of a new genus which he denominates Tachortiis, 

 appears to be peculiar to the magnificent island of 

 Jamaica, where it resides all the year round. The 

 plumage of the upper parts of this interesting bird is of 

 a smoky black colour, becoming brownish on the head ; 

 the sides of the body beneath are also smoky black ; 

 but the chin and throat, and the middle line of the 

 belly, are white, and there is also a broad white 

 band crossing the rump above, but this is often nearly 

 divided into two spots by a black line descending from 

 the back. 



Mr. Gosse's account of the habits of this Palm Swift 

 is so admirable, that we cannot do better than extract 



