BARN SWALLOW. 
129 
many novel sights : should I assert, that in some of my pere- 
grinations I had met with a nation of Indians, all of whom, 
old and young, at the commencement of cold weather, descend 
to the bottom of their lakes and rivers, and there remain until 
the breaking up of frost ; nay, should I affirm, that thousands 
of people, in the neighbourhood of this city, regularly undergo 
the same semi-annual submersion — that I myself had fished 
up a whole family of these from the bottom of Schuylkill, 
where they had lain torpid all winter, carried them home, and 
brought them all comfortably to themselves again ; should I 
even publish this in the learned pages of the Transactions of 
our Philosophical Society, — who would believe me ? Is, then, 
the organization of a Swallow less delicate than that of a man ? 
Can a bird, whose vital functions are destroyed by a short 
privation of pure air and its usual food, sustain, for six months, 
a situation where the most robust man would perish in a few 
hours, or minutes ? Away with such absurdities ! they are 
unworthy of a serious refutation. I should be pleased to meet 
with a man who has been personally more conversant with 
birds than myself, who has followed them in their wide and 
devious routes — studied their various manners — mingled with 
and marked their peculiarities more than I have done ; yet the 
miracle of a resuscitated Swallow, in the depth of winter, from 
the bottom of a mill-pond, is, I confess, a phenomenon in 
ornithology that I have never met with. 
What better evidence have we that these fleet- winged 
tribes, instead of following the natural and acknowledged 
migrations of many other birds, lie torpid all winter in hollow 
trees, caves, and other subterraneous recesses ? That the 
Chimney Swallow, in the early part of summer, may have 
been found in a hollow tree, and in great numbers too, is not 
denied ; such being, in some places of the country, (as will 
be shewn in the history of that species,) their actual places 
of rendezvous, on their first arrival, and their common 
roosting place long after : or, that the Bank Swallows, also, 
soon after their arrival, in the early part of spring, may be 
VOL. II. i 
