62 BIRDS OF DUMFRIESSHIRE 
" A short time ago a great many SwaUows were fo"nddead, 
for a sudden change of temperature amountmg to twenty- 
five degrees is too much for their dehcate frames. 
The earltest date I have found recorded for the arrival 
oi ll Swallow in this county is March 26th. 1903. on wh.ch 
dav some were seen at Lochmaben, the species havmg been 
obse^rd tlree days previously on the Galloway coast.t 
SwXs have probably seldom been later m their arrival 
than in 1908, when they were not seen in the county 
m April 29tL If an average date for their arrival .b 
permissible, it would seem to lie between Apnl 16th and 
loth ; but someone. I forget who has written^ The 
fallacy of averages of arrivals of sprmg migrants has been 
nroved " and in this opinion I entirely concur. 
lie poet James Grahame. writing in hiMsh Georges 
from Annan in the summer of 1808, would have farmers 
observe the migration of the Swallows, for he wrote .- 
" Soon as the eaxUest swallow skims the mead, 
The barley sowing is by some begun ; 
While others wait her clay-bmlt nest, 
ant^rhoXrn^TcuT^^^^^^^ --"t . 
And in his notes on the above he adds : "Magna Mes -lum 
est- experiamur aves " (Ov. Fast., Lib. in.. 814). and 
conknues: "In choosing the proper time for performing 
the different operations of husbandry the farmers plans 
ought not to be regulated by the present appearances of 
S weather. ... On the other hand ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 
undoubtedly possess an instinctive forecast of what »s to be 
2 s^l of'the weather. ... A S-Uow, for inst^^^^^^^^^ 
probably able to traverse Europe m four ^^^^ twenty hours 
consequently its determinations to begin or to contmue its 
rration may easily be the result of observations on the 
2ro"tmosphere, made not in this or that particular 
district, but in a compass of several hundreds of miles. § 
* Dumfries Courier, June 9th, 1840. 
t Ann. Scot. Nat. Hist., 1904, p. 65. 
I British Georgics, p. 73. 
§ Op. cit.y pp. 274, 275. 
