412 
HIRUNDINIM. 
In the fifth volume of the Mag. Nat. Hist., p. 736, Mr. Couch 
remarks : “ It is not long that swifts have frequented stations con- 
venient for my observation. At first they were about two pairs, 
but they have now increased to four or five ; and it is singular, 
that according to my observation, there is always an odd bird.” 
A similar circumstance was, for the first time, remarked by me in the 
summer of 1829, when three swifts resorted to Wolf-hill,* and 
took up their abode between the slates and window-frame of a 
loft not more than twenty feet in height. Here, where a shot 
was not permitted to be fired, and the odd bird could not have 
lost its parent by the fowling-piece, the circumstance was consi- 
dered as “passing strange.” During three months, the usual 
period of the swift's presence in this country, the three mature 
individuals only appeared. The following year, also, an odd 
number of these birds was observed at Wolf-hill, there being 
either five or seven. During those two summers, the houses 
there had, with respect to fallen plaster and the growth of lichens, 
mosses, &c., rather more of a picturesque appearance than is con- 
Odiham.” At the end of June, 1835, I observed numbers of these birds about the 
high limestone cliffs which rise in picturesque beauty above the river Derwent, at 
Matlock in Derbyshire, where it was presumed they had nests. 
* This locality, situated about three miles from Belfast, and elevated 500 feet 
above the sea, was a favourite haunt of the Hirundinidce. During the sojourn of the 
swift, this species, with the three others, might frequently have been seen at one view, 
the swallow, martin, and sand-martin, sweeping in company over the ponds, while 
the swift, though generally maintaining a superior altitude, occasionally broke through 
their ranks ; the whole of the species, on such occasions, and indeed at all times, ex- 
hibiting the most perfect amity. The swift built under the eaves of an outhouse, the 
rafters of which displayed the nest of the swallow beneath them; under an adjoining 
roof, the “ cradle ” of the martin appeared, and not more than a furlong distant was 
the burrow of the sand-martin. It was extremely interesting to the lover of nature 
thus to behold at a glance all the species of these attractive summer wanderers that 
regularly visit the British Islands ; and where they do thus appear, there are gene- 
rally some charming features of natural scenery. 
I observed the four species when (accompanied by Mr. Selby and the Rev. Edw. 
Bigge), in July, 1839, at Kilrea, where the banks of the river Bann are picturesquely 
wooded, and the expansive stream is impeded in its progress from Lough Neagh to 
the ocean by low and scattered rocks rising occasionally above its surface, so as to 
change the smooth mirror into a scene of active and “lusty life,” delightful to the 
angler’s heart. Swifts to the number of not less than a hundred, kept almost on the 
same level with the others. 
In Malta, on the 17th of April, 1841, the day being very fine and warm, our four 
Hirundinidce were in like manner observed in company, flying low, wherever we 
walked about the island ; all the species were in numbers similar to what they are in 
their most favoured haunts in the British Islands. This is a fortnight earlier than 
the swift generally appears in the north of Ireland. 
