On the Rcircai of Swallows in Wiulcr. 93 



VIL A Zciler on the Retreat of Swallows in Winter. From the 



Reverend Mr. PACKARD. 



' Marlhorovgh, Januarjj loili; 1791. 



SIR, 



N a review publislicd in England, of the first volume of 

 the Memoirs of the American Academy of Arts and Sci- 

 ences, I noticed particularly the observations it contained, 

 upon your letter to the late Governour Bowdoin, respecting 

 the torpid state of house-swallows in winter. The review- 

 ers, you recollect, conclude with wishing for the most cir- 

 cumstantial confirmation of the fact, if it be a liict, that 

 those birds exist in mud durinir the cold season. Knowinpj 



your curiosity, and having accidentally received some hints 

 tending to the subject, I pursued them to the following 



effect. 



Lieutenant Nathaniel Orcutt, now living in Bridgewater, 

 a gentleman of indubitable veracity, with whom I am per- 

 sonally acquainted, in answer to a letter, wrote me, that 

 Mr. Ignatius Turner, formerly of Scituate, now deceased, a 

 man of truth and probity, had repeatedly told him, that in 

 Scituate, a mjll-pond being drawn off suddenly by a breach 

 in the dam, he saw the swine of that neighbourhood rooting 

 np house swallows from the mud, from which the water 

 was drained. Being in the winter season, it was a matter of 

 speculation to others as well as to himself. He saw them 

 eatincr the swallows, he said, and saw the wings of some ly- 

 in"" on the nyid, after the swine had done rooting. *IIe 



1 



wrote 



