' CHAPTER XI 



OUR PRICELESS SWALLOWS AND SWIFTS 



NED came into my study one summer day, when I 

 was trying to write a bird article, just as I made 

 a slap at a tormenting housefly and almost 

 upset my inkstand. "Your intention was good," he 

 remarked, "but you aren't as graceful as the swallows 

 yet in your fly-killing. But how did so many flies get 

 in here?" "Oh, someone left the screen door open," I 

 replied; "that is one reason, and, since you have men- 

 tioned swallows, you remind me of another, and that 

 is that we haven't swallows enough to catch all these 

 flies. If they were as common as they used to be, I 

 don't think there would be so many flies to bother us." 

 "Did they use to be very plenty .!*" inquired Ned. "Yes," 

 I said, "according to all accounts the familiar kinds 

 were quite abundant up to about twenty years ago, when 

 the hateful English Sparrow drove them away by 

 fighting them or taking their nests. I remember well 

 when I was small what lots of swallows there were 

 around Boston, where I lived, far more than there are 

 now. Of course I don't mean to say that there weren't 

 any flies then, but there was a big colony of Barn and 

 Eave Swallows on our next door neighbor's barn, and 



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