THE SWALLOWS OF SAN JUAN DE CAPISTRANO 
The mystery of why the swallows return to and depart from 
the old mission at San Juan de Capistrano, at a single flight, 
and on the same day each year, has proved unfathomable to 
ornithologists throughout the years. There is little doubt but 
that they follow a leader, which tends to render more simple 
some phases of their queer behavior, but how does their leader 
determine the day with such unerring accuracy? That is where 
the mystery lies. 
But for sheer mysterious behavior, the crow rates second 
only to the serpent. There exists little doubt but that they have 
a language all their own, and that their vocabulary must con¬ 
tain many words, entirely beyond the grasp of all the other 
creatures. A large family of these mystery birds once invited 
themselves into a neighborhood as permanent residents. Their 
incessant cawing proved too much of a nuisance of nights to 
their human neighbors, who ganged up on them with shotguns 
night and morning. They set all manner of traps for them, 
explosives, live wires, and what have you, but night after night 
they returned to keep their unappreciative human friends 
awake with their noise. When finally the latter concluded that 
they had them on their hands for keeps, the crows scattered 
out to the four winds one morning, covering a radius of fifty 
miles in all directions, and that night not a single crow returned 
to their roost, and not one so much as flew over the place. 
What do you make of it all? Like the writer, you must of 
necessity arrive at the conclusion that they left their roost that 
morning under a binding agreement to shake the dust of this 
community off their feet. 
It is necessary for the rattler to obtain his food supply as 
noiselessly as possible, inasmuch as he often does his hunting 
within hearing distance of man. On such occasions his power 
as a hypnotist stands him in good stead. If he should catch a 
rabbit, squirrel, cat, or bird while he was still in possession of 
all his faculties, then it is by no means impossible that man, 
his mortal enemy, would be attracted to the spot by reason of 
their outcry. On the contrary, if he foregoes the use of his 
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