OF SELBORNE 



305 



LETTER XXI. 



TO THE SAME. 



DEAR SIR; Selborne, Sept. 28, 1774. 



As the swift or black-martin is the largest 

 of the British hirundines, so is it undoubt- 

 edly the latest comer. For I remember 

 but one instance of its appearing before 

 the last week in April: and in some of our 

 late frosty, harsh Springs, it has not been 

 seen till the beginning of Ma^, This spe- 

 cies usually arrives in pairs. 



The swift, like the sand-martin, is very 

 defective in architecture, making no crust, 

 or shell, for its nest : but forming it of dry 

 grasses and feathers, very rudely and inarti- 

 ficially put together. With all my atten- 

 tion to these birds, I have never been able 

 once to discover one in the act of collecting 

 or carrying in materials : so that I have 

 suspected (since their nests are exactly the 

 same) that they sometimes usurp upon the 



VOL. I. X 



