THE SWIFT. 107 



stufiy nests, composed of all sorts of rubbisli ttat the 

 parents can pick up on the wing and stick together 

 against some roof or in a crack with their gummy- 

 saliva. Glutinous salivation is indeed a speciality 

 with the Swifts, and the celebrated birds' nests of 

 which soup is made to gladden the.hearts of such 

 Chinese bigwigs as can afiord to pay about its weight 

 in silver for the raw material are the product of certain 

 birds of this family who rely for their procreant 

 cradles simply on unlimited expectoration ; those 

 which adulterate their secretion with feathers and 

 other extraneous substances producing a far less- 

 marketable article. The eggs of this Swift, like those 

 of its family, generally, are long and white, and few 

 in number, only two to four being laid ; the young are 

 nasty, naked, pink little things, at first blind, with 

 their little helpless wings no bigger than their legs j. 

 then, as the feathers sprout, the wings predominate 

 by degrees, till in the full-grown bird the pirny legs 

 only serve to carry the strong grappling claws which 

 the bird needs for scrambling about and hanging on 

 in its confined nesting and roosting quarters. The 

 toes are nob placed three in front and one behind, as 

 in most -birds, but spread out anyhow like the 

 " fingers " of a starfish, and they grip very closely. 

 On one occasion I picked up in the Museum two birds,, 

 presumably rival males, so tightly clenched by their 



