88 
VERTEBRATA. 
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a brick or tile. Hence this bird is called Hirondelle de Cheminee by tbe French. It builds, how- 
ever, in various other situations, as in the mouths of old wells and unused mines, under the roofs 
of barns and sheds, in belfries, sometimes in 
the fork of a dead tree. A few years ago a 
pair of them built, for two successive sum- 
mers, under the sponsons of the paddle-wheels 
of a steam-tug at Carlisle, England, and suc- 
ceeded in rearing their young, despite the 
daily trips of the boat. It is a pleasing and 
familiar bird, and may be easily tamed. It 
is distributed throughout Europe in summer. 
The House-Martin or Window-Swallow, 
TI. urhica, is five and a half inches long ; 
above black, with violet reflections ; beneath 
white — white varieties being sometimes ob- 
tained ; it builds its nests often near the lower 
cornice of windows, and beneath the eaves of 
granaries and stables. Like the rest of the 
family, it has great art in making its nests 
adhere to the faces of walls, and White tells 
us of one that built against a pane of glass. 
The eggs are four or five in number; there 
are usually two broods in a season ; sometimes 
as many as four. This bird is intimately woven with associations of country life in England ; 
almost every poet has celebrated it. Shakspeare says, beautifully and descriptively : 
" This guest of summer, 
The temple-haunting martlet, does approTe, 
By his loved masonry, that heaven's breath 
Smells wooingly here. No jutting frieze. 
Buttress, or coignes of 'vantage, but this bird 
Hath made his pendent bed and procreant cradle : 
Where they most breed and haunt, I have observed, 
The air is delicate." 
Other European species are the Eufuline Swallow, H. rufula — called Rousseline in France — 
seven inches long, known in the south of Europe and the north of Africa; and the Mountain 
Swallow, H. rupestris, which builds in the crevices of rocks in the high peaks of the Alps and 
the Pyrenees. 
The American Barn-Swallow, IT. mfa, resembles the common swallow of Europe, being 
seven inches long ; upper parts steel-blue, with purple and gTeen reflections ; under parts chest- 
nut color. They arrive among us in April, and depart in October. The enthusiastic Wilson 
says : "There are but few persons in the United States unacquainted with this gay, innocent, and 
active little bird. Indeed, the whole tribe are so distinguished from the rest of small birds, by 
their sweeping rapidity of flight, their peculiar aerial evolutions of wing over our fields and rivers, 
and through our very streets, from morning to night, that the light of heaven itself, the sky, the 
trees, or any other common objects of nature, are not better known than the swallows. We wel- 
come their first appearance with delight, as the faithful harbingers and companions of flowery 
spring and ruddy summer; and when, after a long, frost-bound, and boisterous winter, we hear it 
announced that 'the swallows are come,' what a train of charming ideas are associated with the 
simple tidings ! 
"The wonderful activity displayed by these birds forms a striking contrast to the slow habits 
of most other animals. It may be fairly questioned whether, among the whole feathered tribes 
which heaven has formed to adorn this part of creation, there be any that, in the same space of 
time, pass over an equal extent of surface with the swallow. Let a person take his stand, on a 
fine summer evening, by a new-mown field, meadow, or river-shore, for a short time, and, among 
NEST OF THE COMMOX EUROPEAN SWALLOW. 
