18 
BANK SWALLOW. 
young. — Temm. Alan. d’Oin. 1. p. 429. — Uferschwalbe, Bechst. Naturg. Deut. 
3. p. 922. — Meyer, Tasschenb. Deut. 1. p. 278. — Frisch, t. 18. f. 2. A. — Sand 
Alartin, Br. Zool. 1. No. 170. — Arct. Zool. 2. No. 332. — Alhin, 2. t. 56. 
6. — Lewin’s Br. Birds, t. 125. — Lath. Syn. 4. p. 568. 10. — Will. (Ang.) p. 
213. t. 39. — Mont. Orn. Diet. — Wale. Syn. 2. t. 253. — Pult. Cat. Dorset, p. 
13. — Bewick's Br. Birds, 1. p. 258. — Low's Fau. Oread, p. 74. — Shaw’s Zool. 
10. p. 104. pi. 11. — Flem. Brit. Anim. p. 61. — L.ath. Gen. Hist. 7. p. 263. — 
River Swallow, Griffith's Cuvier. — Selby, pi. 42. fig. 3. pt. 1. p. 131. 
Provincial. — Sand Martin. Bank Martin. Sandy Bank. Sand Swallow. 
This is the smallest species of British swallow ; length four inches 
and three quarters. The whole upper parts of the plumage are of a 
mouse-coloured brown ; the under parts white, except across the breast, 
which is brown ; legs dusky, a little feathered behind ; bill dusky ; 
irides hazel. 
The Bank Swallow is not near so plentiful, and is more local than 
the other species. 
It visits England about the same time as the chimney swallow, re- 
sorting only to such places as are convenient for breeding ; is frequently 
seen about rivers, where it makes a nest in the banks, but most com- 
monly in sand-pits, where it can, with more ease, excavate the sand in 
order to form a secure place for its nest. The holes are generally 
horizontal, and their depth two or three feet. * Whoever looks at the 
bill and claws of this bird cannot fail to be convinced that, so far from 
being “ soft and tender,” as AVliite of Selborne alleges,^ they are 
more than commonly hard and sharp, and admirably adapted for digging. 
The bill, I admit, is small, but its very shortness adds to its strength, 
as it suddenly tapers to a point like a sailor’s marlin spike, or rather 
like the points of a pair of fine compasses when shut. If I compare 
this little sharp borer, as I may well call it, with the caliper-like mandi- 
bles of the sand-wasps, (^Sphecidee, Leach,) and of the burrowing bee, 
which, like our swallows, excavate galleries proportionable to their 
size in hard sand,^ I am compelled to confess that this bird is fur- 
nished with the more efficient instrument. Its operation also is con- 
siderably different. The insects alluded to gnaw into the sand, or 
rather bite off a portion of it and carry it out of the hole in their 
mouths ; but the Bank Swallow, as we have had an opportunity of ob- 
serving, works with its bill shut. 
I have seen one of these swallows cling, with its sharp claws, to the 
face of a sand bank, and peg in its bill, as a miner would do his pick- 
axe, till it had loosened a considerable portion of the hard sand, and 
tumbled it down amongst the rubbish below. In these preliminary 
^ Nat. Hist, of Selborne, i. 299, edit. 1825. 
^ See Insect Architecture. Chap. ii. &c. 
