BANK SWALLOW. 589 
posing of the loose materials, which are seen dropping out at irregular 
intervals. Both sexes work alternately, in the same manner as Wood- 
peckers ; and few ornithological occupations have proved more pleas- 
ing to me than that of watching several hundred pairs of these winged 
artificers all busily and equally engaged, some in digging the burrows, 
others in obtaining food, which they would now and then bring in their 
bills for the use of their mates, or in procuring bits of dry grass or large 
feathers of the duck or goose, for the construction of their nests. 
So industrious are the little creatures that I have known a hole dug 
to the depth of three feet four inches, and the nest finished in four 
days, the first egg being deposited on the morning of the fifth. It 
sometimes happens that soon after the excavation has been commenced, 
some obstruction presents itself, defying the utmost exertions of the 
birds; in which case they abandon the spot, and begin elsewhere in the 
neighbourhood. If these obstructions occur and are pretty general, 
the colony leaves the place; and it is very seldom that, after such an 
occurrence, any swallows of this species are seen near it. I have some- 
times been surprised to see them bore in extremely loose ‘sand. On 
the sea-coast, where soft banks are frequent, you might suppose that, 
as the burrows are only a few inches apart, the sand might fall in so as 
to obstruct the holes and suffocate their inmates; but I have not met 
with an instance of such a calamitous occurrence. Along the banks of 
small rivulets I have found these birds having nests within a foot or 
two of the water, having been bored among the roots of some large trees, 
where I thought they were exposed to mice, rats, or other small pre- 
daceous animals. The nest is generally formed of some short bits of 
dry grass, and lined with a considerable number of large feathers. 
They lay from five to seven eggs for the first brood, fewer for the next. 
They are of an ovate, somewhat pointed form, pure white, eight-twelfths 
of an inch long, and six-twelfths in breadth. 
The young, as soon as they are able to move with ease, often crawl 
to the entrance of the hole, to wait the return of their parents with 
food. On such occasions they are often closely watched by the smaller 
Hawks, as well as the common Crows, which seize and devour them, in 
spite of the clamour of the old birds. These depredations upon the 
young are in fact continued after they have left the nest, and while they 
are perched on the dry twigs of the low trees in the neighbourhood, 
