THE WINDOW MARTIN. 115 



SPECIES 109 THE WINDOW MARTIN. 



Hirundo urbica. Linn. 

 Hirondelle de fenetre. Temm. 



THE beautiful window martin is the most decidedly marked 

 and cleanest looking in plumage of the interesting family to 

 which it belongs. Like its neighbour, the swallow, it is never 

 molested, or receives annoyance from man ; although occa- 

 sionally, when it carries its familiarity too far, and is on the 

 point of becoming more u free than welcome," by taking 

 possession of a window, and building nest beside nest, with 

 the most determined pertinacity in excluding the light, it is 

 generally pardoned, and allowed to bustle away for the short 

 sweet time it sojourns with us. Cleanly and beautiful in 

 plumage, as it is harmless and interesting in its habits, the 

 martin is found in the most opposite localities over the island : 

 equally at home when flying along the streets of the city as 

 by the wayside of the country village, it is an invariable at- 

 tendant upon the great and sublime in nature ; as, around the 

 immense precipices which fringe the western coast of Ireland 

 we observe their tiny forms winging along, 



" Half as gross as beetles," 



midway those bleak and eternal-looking rocks ; and often, 

 when entering a cave situated remote and solitary, we can 

 scarcely believe that those birds, which are clustering about 

 their nests overhead, can be the same sociable companions 

 we hear chirping at daybreak from their " domed palaces" 

 in the window corner. 



Among the many interesting habits which have so much 

 endeared the martin to the community, is the wonderful and 

 beautiful instinct with which it is endowed, returning every 

 year to its primal birthplace. No matter how changed the 

 locality by decay or improvement, the old hallowed spot is 

 found out, and year after year they return, pass over cities and 

 towns, and, by that extraordinary instinct implanted by Pro- 

 vidence, reach at last their old haunts, and seem almost to 

 twitter with a pleased feeling of recognition at the sites of 

 the nests where they had first found life. 



Varied as are its breeding haunts, the window of the country 

 inn and the fissured cavern by the sea-side, we had much 

 pleasure in observing their choice of breeding places in other 

 countries. Over the great doorwaysj of the cathedrals of 

 Notre Dame, at Paris, and St. Ouen, at Rouen, we see im- 

 mense spaces filled up and occupied in those sculptured and 

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