FLIGHT OF SWIFT 225 



round two or three times at his leisure, and then go 

 back, as if nothing had happened, to the nest from 

 which you have taken him. 



What marvellous powers of flight he has ! From 

 three o'clock in the morning of a long summer's day 

 till eight or nine at night, the male bird will be on 

 the wing ; and in that time, making all due allowance 

 for the brief repose he may, perhaps, snatch while 

 he returns at rare intervals, his mouth filled with 

 tiny insects, to feed his mate and the young, he will 

 have covered at least a thousand miles. Sometimes, 

 he will sweep along the surface of the grass or of a 

 river, like the swallow, but never, I think, dipping as 

 he goes, and then, after a few rapid beats of his wings, 

 will sail forwards for a hundred yards or so, by his 

 mere momentum, without any apparent movement of 

 his pinions. Sometimes, he will twist and turn from 

 side to side more like a bat than a bird ; and then 

 again, by a few powerful downward strokes, he will 

 mount aloft with his fellows, and circle round with 

 them at a height in air, at which his body, with its 

 long sweep of wings, will be hardly visible to 

 the eye, his piercing scream hardly audible to the 

 ear. 



But the most joyous and striking scene of all, 



and that which is associated in my mind most 



p 



