324 Wild Life in a Southern County. 
to pick up a lance from the ground whilst going at 
full speed. 
Many birds twirl their ‘r’s ;’ others lisp, as the 
nightingale, and instead of ‘sweet’ say ‘thweet, 
thweet.” The finches call to each other, ‘Kywee, 
kywee—tweo—thweet, which, whatever may be its. 
true translation, has a peculiarly soothing effect on 
the ear. Swifts usually fly at a great height, and, 
being scattered in the atmosphere, do not appear 
numerous ; but sometimes during a stiff gale they 
descend and concentrate over an open field, there 
wheeling round and to and fro only just above the 
grass. Then the ground looks quite black with them 
as they dart over it: they exhibit no fear, but if you 
stand in the midst come all round you so close that 
they might be knocked down with a walking-stick if 
used quick enough. In the air they do not look 
large, but when so near as this they are seen to be 
of considerable size. The appearance of hundreds 
of these jet black, long-winged birds, flying with. 
marvellous rapidity and threading an inextricable 
maze almost, as it were, under foot is very striking. 
The proverbial present of a white elephant is 
paralleled in bird life by the gift of the cuckoo’s egg. 
The bird whose nest is chosen never deserts the 
strange changeling, but seems to feel feeding the 
young cuckoo to be a sacred duty, and sees its own 
young ejected and perishing without apparent con- 
cern. My attention was called one spring to a robin’s 
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