SWALLOW. 270 



veracity, but I cannot say that I ever saw an individual at large 

 beyond the month of November, and which only occurred to me once 

 in Kent.* Experiments have been made of preserving Swallows 

 throughout the winter in confinement, and this was effected by Mr. 

 J. Pearson, of London, and recorded in Mr. Bewick's work ; f they 

 were fed with the same food as the Nightingale, that they throve 

 extremely well, sang their song through the winter, and soon after 

 Christmas began to moult, which time they got through without 

 any difficulty, and lived three or four years, regularly moulting 

 every year at the usual time. The whole of this account is well 

 worth reading. 



The Swallow is supposed to take up its winter quarters in Sene- 

 gal,:]: and parts adjacent, and seems to inhabit occasionally the whole 

 of the Old Continent, being known from Norway to the Cape of 

 Good Hope, on the one hand ; and from Kamtschatka to India and 

 Japan on the other; not uncommon in Sumatra. In Sweden are 

 called Barn Swallows, § where they build within the roofs of houses. 

 The Swallow first appears at Gibraltar the middle of February, 

 and becomes numerous the first week in March; does not build in 

 chimnies as in the colder climates for a constancy, but chiefly in open 

 staircases, galleries, and cloisters; congregates the end of July, and 



* I have several times seen a Swallow at large the middle of October, and once No- 

 vember 6, 1786, saw a single Swallow flying backward and forward before my door at Dart- 

 ford, in Kent, at ten o'clock in the morning, the wind at N. E. and the sun shining quite 

 strong; and Mr. Lambert on the 22d of November, 1782; but at Bath, on November 21, 

 1791, were seen at least a dozen, flying about, near the Circus, and an anecdote is in print 

 of a Swallow being seen flying at Shaftesbury, on the 22d of January, 1796. — See Saint 

 James's Chronicle, Jan. 30, 1796 : more such circumstances might be mentioned. 



f Bewick's Birds, Vol. i. p. 248. — Art. Swallow. 



% Mr. Adanson says, " they are never seen but after October, in Senegal, along with 

 " the Quails, Wagtails, Kites, and some other Birds of Passage, which go thither every 

 " year, when the cold drives them from the temperate countries of Europe."— Voy. to Sene- 

 gal, p. 121 ; and again in p. 163, mentions that Swallows took up their residence at night 

 in his hut, which was pretty dark' within, perched on the rafters ; however, it is doubted 

 by some, whether they were our Swallows. 



§ Ledu-Swala. Habitat in domibus intra tectum.— Faun. suec. 



