SWALLOWS. 197 



go beyond their usual speed, and exert a rapidity 

 almost too quick for the eye to follow. 



After this circumstantial detail of the life and 

 discerning crropyrj of the swallow, I shall add, for 

 your farther amusement, an anecdote or two, not 

 much in favour of her sagacity : 



A certain swallow built for two years together 

 on the handles of a pair of garden- shears, that was 

 stuck up against the boards in an outhouse, and 

 therefore must have her nest spoiled whenever 

 that implement was wanted. And, what is stranger 

 still, another bird of the same species built its nest 

 on the wings and body of an owl, that happened by 

 accident to hang dead and dry from the rafter of 

 a barn. This owl, with the nest on its wings, and 

 with eggs in the nest, was brought to a distin- 

 guished naturalist as a curiosity worthy the most 

 elegant private museum in Great Britain. The 

 owner, struck with the oddity of the sight, fur- 

 nished the bringer with a large shell, or conch, 

 desiring him to fix it just where the owl hung. 

 The person did as he was ordered ; and the fol- 

 lowing year a pair, probably the same pair, built 

 their nest in the conch, and laid their eggs. 



The owl and the conch make a strange, gro- 

 tesque appearance, and are not the least curious 

 specimens in that wonderful collection of art and 

 nature *. 



Thus is instinct in animals, taken the least out 

 of its way, an undistinguishing, limited faculty, 

 and blind to every circumstance that does not 

 immediately respect self-preservation, or lead 

 at once to the propagation or support of their 

 species. 



1 Sir Ashton Lever's Museum. 



