208 NATURAL HISTORY 



and feeding over the river just below the bridge : others 

 haunt some of the churches of the Borough next the fields ; 

 but do not venture, like the house martin, into the close 

 crowded part of the town. 



The Swedes have bestowed a very pertinent name on 

 this swallow, calling it ring-swala, from the perpetual rings 

 or circles that it takes round the scene of its nidification. 



Swifts feed on Qoleoptera, or small beetles with hard 

 cases over their wings, as well as on the softer insects ; 

 but it does not appear how they can procure gravel 1 to 

 grind their food, as swallows do, since they never settle on 

 the ground. Young ones, overrun with Hippoboscce, are 

 sometimes found, under their nests, fallen to the ground ; 

 the number of vermin rendering their abode insupportable 

 any longer. They frequent in this village several abject 

 cottages ; yet a succession still haunts the same unlikely 

 roofs : a good proof this that the same birds return to the 

 same spots. As they must stoop very low to get up under 

 these humble eaves, cats lie in wait, and sometimes catch 

 them on the wing. 



On the 5th of July, 1775, I again untiled part of a roof 

 over the nest of a swift. The dam sat in the nest ; but so 

 strongly was she affected by natural (rropyy for her brood, 

 which she supposed to be in danger, that, regardless of her 

 own safety, she would not stir, but lay sullenly by them, 

 permitting herself to be taken in hand. The squab 

 young we brought down and placed on the grass-plot, 

 where they tumbled about, and were as helpless as a new- 

 born child. While we contemplated their naked bodies, 

 their unwieldy disproportioned abdomina, and their heads, 

 too heavy for their necks to support, we could not but 

 wonder when we reflected that these shiftless beings in a 

 little more than a fortnight would be able to dash through 

 the air almost with the inconceivable swiftness of a meteor ; 



1 Very few of the soft-billed birds eat gravel, and we are inclined to 

 think that the particles of grit found in the stomachs of swallows have 

 found their way there accidentally whilst the birds have been collecting 

 mud for their nests. ED. 



