374 



NATURAL HIS TOUT. 



Chinese and other Asiatic people. Dr. Jerdon says : -" The nest, when pure and of the first make, 

 is composed entirely of inspissated mucus from the large salivary glands of the bird. It is very small, 

 bluntly triangular in form, and slightly concave within ; of a semi-transparent, fibrous sort of texture, 

 bluish-white in colour, and with the fibres, as it were, crossed and interlaced. When the nests of the 

 first make are taken away, the second nests are mixed with feathers, and occasionally other foreign 

 substances. The eggs are two in number, and pure white." Mr. E. L. Layard gives the following 

 account of a visit to a cave inhabited by the Indian Swiftlet in Ceylon : " I have at last visited the 



THEE SWIFT. 



cave in which Colloccdia md-ifica* builds, and will now, with the aid of my journal, give ail the 

 information I can, sending you bii-ds skinned and in spirit, and a young nestling taken from the nest 

 with my own hand. The cave is situated at a place called Havissay, about thirty-five miles from the 

 sea and twenty from the river, and about 500 feet up a fine wood-clad hill, called Diagallagoolawa, or 

 Hoonoomooloocota. Its dimensions are as follows : Length between fifty and sixty feet, about twenty- 

 six broad, and twenty high. It is a mass of limestone rock, which has cracked off the hill-side, and slipped 

 down on to some boulders below its original position, forming a hollow triangle. There are three 

 entrances to the cave ; one at each end, and one very small one in the centre. The floor consists of 

 large boulders, covered to the depth of two or three inches with the droppings of the birds, old and 

 young, and the bits of grass they bring in to fabricate their nests. The only light which penetrates 

 the cavern from the entrances above mentioned is very dim. When my eyes, however, got accustomed 



* Nest-building. 



