48 
HIRUNDO VIRIDIS. 
descends rounding on the breast ; front and chin, deep 
chestnut ; belly, vent, and lining of the wing, light 
chestnut ; wings and tail, brown black, slightly glossed 
with reflections of green ; tail, greatly forked, the exte- 
rior feather on each side an inch and a half longer than 
the next, and tapering towards the extremity, each 
feather, except the two middle ones, marked on its 
inner vane with an oblong spot of white ; lores, black ; 
eye, dark hazel ; sides of the mouth, yellow ; legs, dark 
purple. 
The female differs from the male in having the belly 
and vent rufous white, instead of light chestnut ; these 
parts are also slightly clouded with rufous ; and the 
exterior tail-feathers are shorter. 
These birds are easily tamed, and soon become ex- 
ceedingly gentle and familiar. I have frequently kept 
them in my room for several days at a time, where they 
employed themselves in catching flies, picking them 
from my clothes, hair, &c. calling out occasionally as 
they observed some of their old companions passing the 
windows. 
72 . HIRUNDO riRIDIS, WILSON. H. bicolor, vieill. 
GREEN, BLUE, OR WHITE BELLIED SWALLOW, WILSON. 
WILSON, PLATE XXXVIII. FIG. III. 
This is the species hitherto supposed by Europeans 
to he the same with their common martin, hirundo 
urbica , a bird no where to he found within the United 
States. The English martin is blue black above ; the 
present species greenish blue ; the former has the whole 
rump white, and the legs and feet are covered with 
short white downy feathers ; the latter has nothing of 
either. That ridiculous propensity in foreign waiters, 
to consider most of our birds as varieties of their own, 
has led them into many mistakes, w 7 hich it shall be the 
business, of the author of the present work to point 
out, decisively, wherever he may meet w ith them. 
The white-bellied swallow arrives in Pennsylvania a 
