GENERAL DISTRIBUTION OF SWALLOWS 371 



to swallows, and the approach of spring: "HXff, fiXd-t ^eXidiuv 

 xaXaq lapaz ayouaa, xat xaXouz iviauTouq • " Yenit, venit Mrundo 

 pulcras ducens horas et annos pulcros.^ 



The story of Proctie is very differently told by writers. 

 Procne was sister of Philomela, daughter of Pandion, king of 

 Athens, and wife of Tereus, king of Thrace. Procne became 

 by Tereus mother of a son, Itys. After living some time in 

 Thrace, she wished to see her sister, and induced Tereus to go 

 to Athens and prevail upon Pandion to allow him to bring 

 Philomela. On the way, Tereus violated Philomela, cut out 

 her tongue that she might not betray him, and then came to 

 Procne with the story that her sister had died on the way. 

 But Philomela contrived to communicate to Procne the story 

 of the outrage; and Procne thereupon killed her son Itys, 

 and served up his flesh to his father. Then the two sisters 

 fled, pursued by Tereus with an axe, and finding themselves 

 about to be overtaken, they prayed to the gods to change them 

 into birds. Philomela thereupon became a nightingale {aTjSiov), 

 and Procne a swallow (xehdwv). Tereus himself was turned 

 into a hoopoo {eKoip). Authorities reverse the respective situa- 

 tions of the sisters, before and after their transformation ; but 

 this account accords best with the signification of the words. 

 " The legend we have been giving is one of those invented to 

 account mythically for the habits and properties of animals. 

 The twitter of the swallow sounds like itys, itys ; the note of 

 the nightingale was regarded as lugubrious, and the hoopoo 

 chases these birds."* 



General Distribution of Swallows 



Swallows are thoroughly cosmopolitan. Their range north- 

 ward carries them beyond the arctic circle, both in America 

 and in Europe, and they straggle toward the pole as far as any 

 birds are known to go. The Bank Swallow has been observed 

 in the Parry Islands, while the common European Barn Swal- 

 low has been seen both in Spitzbergen and Nova Zembla. 

 Cotyle riparia and Chelidon urhiaa both breed in numbers in 

 Lapland, up to latitude 70° N. Many of the species, likewise, 

 have an enormous range ; thus, Hirundo rustica inhabits 

 Europe, Asia, and Africa, from Lapland to the Cape of Good 

 Hope and the Moluccas. 



* This is simply the outline of the myth, abridged from Anthon, Class. 

 Diet. 1041. [New York, 1876.] The classic story is told at great length and 

 with profuse embellishment by some, «. g. Gesner, De Avibm, 1617, pp. 503-505. 



