332 NOTES ON NEW ENGLAND BIRDS 



BANK SWALLOW 



May 23, 1854. Saw in Dakiu's land, near the road, 

 at the bend of the river, fifty-nine bank swallows' holes 

 in a small upright bank within a space of twenty by 

 one and a half feet (in the middle), part above and 

 part below the sand-line. This would give over a hun- 

 dred birds to this bank. They continually circling about 

 over the meadow and river in front, often in pairs, one 

 pursuing the other, and filling the air with their twit- 

 tering. 



May 7, 1856. In the first hollow in the bank this 

 side of Clamshell, where sand has been dug for the 

 meadow, are a hundred or more bank swallows at 2 r. m. 

 (I suspect I have seen them for some time) engaged in 

 prospecting and digging their holes and circling about. 

 It is a snug place for them, — though the upright 

 portion of the bank is only four or five feet high, — a 

 semi-circular recess facing the southeast. Some are 

 within scratching out the sand, — I see it cast out of 

 the holes behind them, — others hanging on to the en- 

 trance of the holes, others on the flat sandy space be- 

 neath in front, and others circling about, a dozen rods 

 off over the meadow. Theirs is a low, dry, grating twit- 

 ter, or rather rattle, less metallic or musical than the 

 vite vite and twittering notes of barn and white-bellied 

 swallows. They are white-bellied, dark winged and 

 tailed, with a crescent of white [sic] nearly around the 

 lower part of the neck, and mouse-colored heads and 

 backs. The upper and greater part of this bank is a 

 coarse sliding gravel, and they build only in the per- 



