of Selborne 139 



buildings, and playing about l)cfore them, make people 

 think that several old ones attend one nest. They are 

 often capricious in fixing on a nesting place, beginning 

 many edifices, and leaving them unfinished ; but when 

 once a nest is completed in a sheltered place, it serves 

 for several seasons. Those which l)recd in a ready 

 finished house get the start in hatching of those that 

 build new by ten days or a fortnight. These industrious 

 artificers are at their labours in the long days before four 

 in the morning : when they fix their materials they 

 plaster them on with their chins, moving their heads with 

 a quick vibratory motion. They dip and wash as they 

 fly sometimes in very hot weather^ but not so frequently 

 as swallows. It has been observed that martins usually 

 build to a north-east or north-west aspect, that the heat 

 of the sun may not crack and destroy their nests : but 

 instances are also remembered where they bred for many 

 years in vast abundance in an hot stifled inn-yard, against 

 a wall facing to the south. 



Birds in general are wise in their choice of situation : 

 but in this neighbourhood every summer is seen a strong 

 proof to the contrary at an house without eaves in an 

 exposed district, where some martins build year by year 

 in the corners of the windows. But, as the corners of 

 these windows (which face to the south-east and south- 

 west) are too shallow, the nests are washed down every 

 hard rain ; and yet these birds drudge on to no purpose 

 from summer to summer, without changing their aspect 

 or house. It is a piteous sight to see them labouring 

 when half their nest is washed away and bringing 

 dirt . . . ^^ generis lapsi sarcire ruiiiasr Thus is instinct 

 a most wonderful unequal faculty ; in some instances 

 so much above reason, in other respects so far below it ! 

 Martins love to frequent towns, especially if there are 

 great lakes and rivers at hand ; nay they even affect the 

 close air of London. And I have not only seen them 

 nesting in the Borough, but even in the Strand and 

 Fleet-street; but then it was obvious from the dingincss 

 of their aspect that their feathers partook of the filth of 

 that sooty atmosphere. Martins are by far the least agile 



