604 
SWALLOW TRIBE. 
pearance at Whitehall, near Lake Champlain, in the 
western part of the state of New York. In these places 
their increase seems to have kept pace with the time since 
their arrival, augmenting their nests from a single clus- 
ter to several hundreds in the course of 4 or 5 years. 
Vieillot observed one at sea off Nova Scotia, and they 
have, in fact, long been commonly known in that province. 
In 1818, as I learn from J. W. Boott, Esq., they began 
to build at Crawford’s, near the base of the White Moun- 
tains of New Hampshire. In the summer of 1830 a few 
nests were seen by General Dearborn at Winthrop in 
Maine ; he had also heard of one at Gardiner in the same 
state. The hibernal retreat of this species would ap- 
pear to be in the West Indies, as they were seen in Por- 
to Rico by Vieillot, and one was also observed in St. 
Domingo by the same author. 
In the Western States they arrive from the south early 
in April, and almost immediately begin to construct their 
nests. They commence their labor at the dawn and 
continue their operations until near mid-day. They are 
made of pellets of sandy mud, disposed in layers until 
the fabric with its entrance assumes the form of a pro- 
jecting retort, agglutinated to cliffs or the walls of build- 
ings, as convenience may offer. From the nature of the 
friable materials employed, the whole is frail and crum- 
bling in the possession of any but the airy owners. The 
internal lining is of straw and dried grass, negligently 
disposed for the reception of the eggs, which are usually 
4, and white, spotted with dusky-brown. They raise but 
a single brood, who with their parents, after several at- 
tempts at mustering, finally disappear in August, as sud- 
denly as they came. 
Like the rest of their congeners, they are almost per- 
petually on the wing in quest of flies and other small in- 
