HIRUNDO RUSTICA. 



(The Swallow.) 

 By Mr. G. D. ROWLEY. 



[Continued from vol. i. p. 98.] 



' Mary. — Go ? Must you go, indeed — again — so soon ? 



Why, Nature^s licensed vagabond_, the Swallow, 

 That might live always in the sun^s warm heart. 

 Stays longer here in our poor north than you : 

 Knows where he nested — ever comes again. 



Philip.^ — And, Madam, so shall I.^^ 



Tennyson's Queen Mary, Act. v. p. 224. 



One of the greatest pleasures a man can have is to receive the spring 

 immigrants as they land on the south coast. No sluggard need try — unless 

 v^ith the Swallow, which travels by day. This satisfaction is unstained 

 by blood, and not by pang of death produced. The dim expiring eye and 

 the struggle of parting existence should be painful to the contemplation of 

 even the selfish man, if he reflects that he also may have to undergo the 

 same which he inflicts. 



The arrival of these feathered flowers of air forces even the dullest 

 person to study migration; and so, I have no doubt, thought Mopsus, 

 who, let me remind my readers, was soothsayer to the Argonautic Expedition 

 (as most chronographers tell, about 1250 b.c.) and knew the language of 

 birds, an idea which probably originated thus: — He was a clever fellow, 



M 2 



