216 WILD LIFE ON A NORFOLK ESTUARY 



A Mr. Stagg, who resides near the Quay, in a house under 

 whose eaves swifts have nested for many years, informed me 

 that one bird visited him on the I3th, but disappeared agafn, 

 and then none were seen until the igth, probably part of the 

 party that came to the old mill. I was very much interested 

 in the behaviour of the " mill " swifts, which, fortunately, 

 had reared their young ones, and seen them safely a-wing, 

 before the mill had been so far demolished as to lay bare 

 their particular nesting places. 



I was exceedingly anxious to note the appearance of the 

 "mill" swifts in the spring of 1906. May 7th and 8th were 

 very fine, warm days, and probably tempted by these condi- 

 tions, some swifts arrived on the Qth. That afternoon three 

 pairs came in, and in a very excited state flew for hours 

 around the spot where the mill had been, at a height corre- 

 sponding with their old nesting quarters. Even the tall 

 willows around which they used to catch moths had vanished, 

 while, added to these disappointments, a bleak north-east 

 wind set in on that day, so that they had neither food nor 

 shelter. I saw no more of them after the night of the 9th 

 for some days, but about twenty were flying around again in 

 very close formation, screaming and excited, on the evening 

 of the 28th, after which date they seem to have betaken 

 themselves to other quarters, having found it useless to look 

 for their old habitation, and being scared by the noise of the 

 workmen building new houses on the spot, and the host of 

 children at play in the old mill yard. 



My earliest date of the arrival of the swift is May 4th 

 (1891), the latest on which I have seen it being September 

 (1891). 



SWALLOWS AND BUTTERFLIES 



In October, 1905, I wrote to the Eastern Daily Press as 

 follows : 



" SIR, Of course the swallows mostly are gone, and those 

 few weaklings, latest hatched of the summer broods, that 

 furtively, and with melancholy quietude hawk for the equally 

 miserable flies which are now basking on the sunnier sides of 

 our houses, when there happens to be a little sunshine, will 



