142 LAND-BIRDS AND GAME-BIRDS 
Railway, in Brookville, Indiana, is built upon stone piers, and 
spans the hydraulic canal, some five or six feet above the water. 
While at the depot during the past summer I saw a bank 
swallow fly under the building with several blades of grass in 
her bill; and being’ curious to see what she would do with 
them, I watched her, and saw her carry them through a two- 
inch auger hole, which had been bored through a pine board. 
The spot was inaccessible, owing to the water; but I know 
from the droppings about the hole that this was her nest.” 
It is almost needless to add that this species usually burrows 
in sand. The swallows lay four or five eggs, which are white, 
unmarked, or spotted with brown and purplish. 
I. HIRUNDO 
(A) HorReoruM. Barn Swallow. 
(A very common summer-resident in most inhabited parts of 
New England.) 
(a). About 44 inches long from bill to fork of the tail. 
Above, a dark lustrous steel-blue. An imperfect collar, the 
same. Under parts and forehead, chestnut-red. Belly and 
lower breast, paler. Tail forficate. Outer feathers much 
longer than the others (from 3-2 inches), and all, except the 
middle pair, with a white spot. 
(b). The nest is placed on the beams or rafters of a barn or 
similar building, and usually is finished here by the middle of 
May. Aset of four or five eggs is then laid, and often another 
in June, or even the early part of July. The eggs average 
°75 X ‘55 of an inch, and are white, sprinkled tolerably thickly . 
with purplish and brown. 
(c). The Barn Swallows are to be found almost throughout 
New England. They reach the neighborhood of Boston gener- 
ally in the last week of April, but sometimes earlier, and re- 
turn to the South in the first week of September. They are 
usually very common in those places where they are found, 
since they are almost invariably more or less colonial. They 
are particularly abundant in old country-villages, and about 
farms, where most of the barns, on account of their liberal 
