400 



AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY. 



surely he. Dear old Hirundo. The same iridescent blue claw hammer 

 coat, the same brown vest and white duck trousers. Describing the 

 same matchless curves to the accompaniment of the same sweet twitter. 

 And yes, there is the same nest plastered, not to the rafters of 

 a barn, for there were no barns in St. Michaels as there was nothing- 

 to put into them, there being neither horned cattle nor horses, only a 

 flock of sheep which had to be shipped south to spend the winter, 

 but on the rafters of an open porch of one of the old log buildings 

 built by the Russians when they first occupied this country over two 

 hundred years ago, and when the writer was there used by the 

 U. S. Government as a Custom House. Here our little friends had 

 built their nests. The situation most like that usually choosen by the 

 Pewee at home, but still a typical Barn Swallow's nest lined with 

 feathers, not of the barn yard fowl as is the case at home where they 

 are easily gathered right under the "swallow hole" of the old barn but 

 of rarer species, even the soft down of the eider ducks which were 

 abundant near shore and possibly some rarer still, may be of the Rosy 

 Gull or other fair wanderer of this northern clime. 



St. Michaels, Alaska, looking towards the sea and showing nearly all 

 the frame buildings in the place, offices of the commercial companies 



