ALPINE SWIFT. 297 



CYPSELUS MELBA. 

 ALPINE SWIFT. 



(PLATE 18.) 



Hirundo major hispanica, Briss. Orn. ii. p. 504 (1760). 



Hirundo melba, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 345 (1766) ; et auctorum plurimorum 



Latham, Gmelin, (Bonaparte), (Naumann), (Brehm), (Dresser), (Newton), &c. 

 Hirundo alpina, Scop. Ann. I. Hist. Nat. p. 166 (1769). 

 Micropus alpinua (Scop.), Wolf, Taschenb. i. p. 282 (1810). 

 Cypselus melba (Linn.), ttlig. Prodr. p. 230 (1811). 

 Hirundo gularis, Steph. Shaw's Gen. Zool. x. p. 99 (1817). 

 Cypselus gutturalis, Vi'eitt. Tall. Encyd. Meth. p. 534 (1822). 

 Cypselus alpinus (Scop.), Meyer, Taschenb. Zus. u. Ber. p. 255 (1822). 

 Micropus melba (Linn.), Boie, Isis, 1844, p. 165. 

 Micropus gutturalis ( Vieill.), Boie, Isis, 1844, p. 165. 



The Alpine Swift has been obtained so frequently in the British Islands 

 that a detailed account of each capture is unnecessary. The earliest in- 

 stance known is that of an example which was shot off the south coast of 

 Ireland about the middle of the year 1829, and came into the possession 

 of Mr. Sinclaire, by whom it was sent to Selby, who recorded the 

 particulars of its capture (Edinb. Journ. Nat. and Geogr. Sc. n. s. iii. 

 p. 170, 1831). Since this date about a score of specimens have been 

 obtained, many of which were procured in Ireland, but the greater number 

 in England, where it has occurred as far north as Durham ; but it appears 

 never to have been noticed in Scotland. 



The Alpine Swift breeds in the alpine districts of Europe south of the 

 Baltic, in the Ural Mountains its range extending up to lat. 55. South 

 of the Mediterranean it breeds in the mountains of North Africa and 

 Abyssinia*. Eastwards its range extends through Asia Minor, Palestine 

 West Turkestan, the West Himalayas, and the mountain-ranges of West 

 India and Ceylon. In Abyssinia, India, and Ceylon it is said to be a 

 resident ; but further north it is only a summer visitor, leaving in autumn 

 to winter in Damara Land, the Cape Colony, and Natal. In the cold 

 season it is occasionally seen in most parts of India as far east as Calcutta 

 and it has occurred more or less accidentally on migration in Denmark 

 Heligoland, and various parts of the plains of Germany as far north as 

 Berlin. The Alpine Swift has no near ally in Asia ; but in the Bogos 



* Dresser, in his ' Birds of Europe,' states that Blanford met with this bird in the plains 

 of Abyssinia ; but this is a blunder, Dresser having inadvertently transferred Blanford's 

 remarks on the Common Swift to the Alpine Swift. 



