or SELBOllNE. 



283 



way, as they are going to roost in deep 

 woods : at the dawn of day they always 

 revisit their nest-trees, and are preceded 

 a few minutes by a flight of daws, that act, 

 as it were, as their harbingers. 



I am, &c. 



LETTER XVIII. 



TO THE SAME. 

 DEAR SIR; Selborne, Jan. 29, 1774. 



The house swallow, or chimney-swallow, 

 is, undoubtedly, the first comer of all the 

 British hirundines ; and appears in general 

 on or about the thirteenth of April, as I 

 have remarked from many years observa- 

 tion. Not but now and then a straggler is 

 seen much earlier : and, in particular, when 

 I was a boy I observed a swallow for a 

 whole day together on a sunny warm 

 Shrove Tuesday ; which day could not fall 



