490 
4 
Judging from the plate in the ‘Fauna Japonica,’ the bird found in Japan is H. erythropygia, 
Sykes, and not the present species. 
In its habits the present species is said to agree closely with our common Chimney-Swallow. 
Canon Tristram writes (Ibis, 1867, p. 362):—“It is a beautiful bird on the wing, showing its 
chestnut collar and rump to great advantage, as it turns continually, flying much more slowly 
than the common Swallow, and beating repeatedly over a more limited extent of ground. 
Though feeding in flocks, I never knew this Swallow to breed in company; and yery rarely were 
two nests to be found in one cave. The nest is a beautiful structure, composed of the same 
materials as that of the House-Martin, but is invariably attached to the flat surface of the 
underside of the roof of a cave or vault. It is of the shape of a retort, with a bulb of the size 
of a Thrush’s nest, large and roomy, the neck or passage for entrance being sometimes a foot or 
more in length; the inside of the clay chamber is warmly lined with feathers. Laborious as 
must be the construction of this elaborate edifice, the little architects are very fastidious, and 
frequently desert two or three half-finished nests in succession, commencing a new one in the 
same cavern. But after all they are sadly bullied. So tempting a domicile invites unscru- 
pulous vagrants; the Galilean Swift (Cypselus affinis) assumes the rights and wrongs of the 
compound householder and exercises the franchise of the nest, leaving the Swallow to pay the 
rates. The Swift contracts the entrance by a casement of feathers and gelatinous secretion, and 
then bids defiance to the original landlord. Mr. Simpson found the Syrian Nuthatch indulging 
in similar acts of lawlessness in Greece. When so treated the Swallow does not leave the cave, 
but humbly sets to work to construct a new nest not far off. A favourite breeding-place of 
H. rufula is under the arches of the corridors of the Monastery on Mount Carmel. The eggs 
are four in number, pure white, considerably larger than those of the House-Martin, and flatter 
at the small end.” 
I am indebted to Mr. H. Seebohm for the following notes on the breeding-habits of this 
Swallow, he having met with it when on a collecting-trip in Greece and Asia Minor with 
Dr. Kriiper. “I found Hirundo rufula,” he writes, “breeding both at Nymphion, east of 
Smyrna, and in the Parnassus. Both in Asia Minor and in Greece it is a summer visitor only, 
arriving early in April, at least a month later than its congeners Hirundo rustica and urbica. 
Fresh-laid eggs may be obtained from the middle of May to the middle of June. I did not 
meet with any evidence of its breeding a second time, except where the first nest had been 
destroyed or disturbed before the eggs were hatched. I have a young bird in full plumage of 
the first year, shot on the 30th July. During the breeding-season it frequents the warm 
sheltered valleys in the highest parts of the vine-regions. We never met with it so high up as 
the pine-regions. On the wing Hirundo rufula is quite as much at home as rustica or urbica, 
and may not unfrequently be seen hawking for flies in company with both these species. It 
may, however, be easily distinguished from those birds at some distance, as it possesses the long 
forked tail of the one in addition to the white rump of the other. It may also be distinguished 
by its note, which resembles that of rustica, but may be described as a low whit compared with 
the loud whet of that bird. The limestone crags of the Parnassus and of Asia Minor east of 
Smyrna abound in caves, on the roofs of which this bird builds its curious nest; but so far as my 
observation goes it never breeds in colonies. The nest is built of mud, and is very similar to 
