MISCELLANEOUS OBSERVATIONS SWIFTS. 167 



and the most familiar; it also appears the last of any. It 

 builds in a vine, or a sweet-brier, against the wall of a house, 

 or in the hole of a wall, or on the end of a beam or plate, and 

 often close to the post of a door, where people are going 

 in and out all day long. This bird does not make the least 

 pretension to song, but uses a little inward wailing note when 

 it thinks its young in danger from cats, or other annoyances : 

 it breeds but once, and retires early.* 



Selborne parish alone can and has exhibited at times more 

 than half the birds that are ever seen in all Sweden : the 

 former has produced more than one hundred and twenty 

 species, the latter only two hundred and twenty-one. Let 

 me add also, that it has shewn near half the species that were 

 ever known in Great Britain.f 



On a retrospect, I observe that my long letter carries with 

 it a quaint and magisterial air, and is very sententious ; but 

 when I recollect ^that you requested stricture and anecdote, 

 hope you will pardon the didactic manner for the sake of the 

 information it may happen to contain. 



LETTER LXI. 



TO THE HON. DAINES HARRINGTON. 



SELBORNE, September 28, 1774. 



DEAR SIR, As the swift, or black-marten, is the largest 

 of the British hirundines y so it is undoubtedly the latest comer : 

 for I remember but one instance of its appearing before the 

 last week in April ; and in some of our late frosty harsh 

 springs, it has not been seen till the beginning of May. This 

 species usually arrives in pairs. 



The swift, like the sand-marten, is very defective in 

 architecture, making no crust, or shell, for its nest, but 

 forming it of dry grasses and feathers, very rudely and 

 inartificially put together. With all my attention to these 

 birds, I have never been able once to discover one in the act 

 of collecting or carrying in materials : so that I have suspected 

 (since their nests are exactly the same) that they sometimes 



* The beam-bird, (muscicapa grisola, Linn.) It is very rare in 

 Scotland. The nest is neatly constructed, of long green moss, intermixed 

 with the catkins of the hazel and filbert, the interior lined with straw and 

 wool. ED. 



f Sweden 221, Great Britain 252 species, There are now 368, 

 including the occasional visitants. ED. 



