cessary as it is to the perfect understanding of this department of our own!

The Barn Swallow is seven inches long, and thirteen inches in extent; bill black; upper part of the head, neck, back, rump and tail coverts, steel blue, which 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 reflexions of green; tail greatly forked, the exterior feather on each side an inch and a half longer that 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 exceedingly 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.

SPECIES 3. HIRUNDO VIRIDIS.*

WHITE-BELLIED SWALLOW.

[Plate XXXVIII.—Fig. 3.]

PEALE'S Museum, No. 7707.

THIS is the species hitherto supposed by Europeans to be the same with their common Martin, Hirundo urbica, a bird no where to be 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 writers, to consider most of our birds as varieties of their own, has led them into many mistakes, which it shall be the business of the author of the present work to point out, decisively, wherever he may meet with them.

The White-bellied Swallow arrives in Pennsylvania a few days later than the preceding species. It often takes possession of an apartment in the boxes appropriated to the Purple Martin; and also frequently builds and hatches in a hollow tree. The nest consists of fine loose dry grass, lined with large downy feathers, rising above its surface, and so placed as to curl inwards. and completely conceal the eggs. These last are usually four or five in number, and pure white. They also have two broods in the season.

The voice of this species is low and guttural: they are more disposed to quarrel than the Barn Swallows, frequently fighting in the air for a quarter of an hour at a time, particularly in spring, all the while keeping up a low rapid chatter. They also sail more in flying; but during the breeding season frequent the same

• Hirundo bicolor, VIEILL. Ois. de l'Am. Sept. pl. 31.

situations in quest of similar food. They inhabit the northern Atlantic states as far as the District of Maine, where I have myself seen them; and my friend Mr. Gardiner informs me, that they are found on the coast of Long Island and its neighbourhood. About the middle of July I observed many hundreds of these birds sitting on the flat sandy beach near the entrance of Great Egg Harbour. They were also very numerous among the myrtles of these low islands, completely covering some of the bushes. One man told me, that he saw one hundred and two shot at a single discharge. For some time before their departure they subsist principally on the myrtle berries (myrica cerifera) and become extremely fat. They leave us early in September.

This species appears to have remained hitherto undescribed, owing to the misapprehension before mentioned. It is not perhaps quite so numerous as the preceding, and rarely associates with it to breed, never using mud of any kind in the construction of its nest.

The White-bellied Swallow is five inches and three quarters long, and twelve inches in extent; bill and eye black; upper parts a light glossy greenish blue; wings brown black, with slight reflexions of green; tail forked, the two exterior feathers being about a quarter of an inch longer than the middle ones, and all of a uniform brown black; lores black; whole lower parts pure white; wings when shut extend about a quarter of an inch beyond the tail; legs naked, short and strong, and, as well as the feet, of a dark purplish flesh colour; claws stout.

The female has much less of the greenish gloss than the male, the colours being less brilliant; otherwise alike.

LATH. Syn. IV, p. 568-10.-Arct. Zool. 11, No. 332.-L'Hirondelle de rivage, BUFF. vi, 632. I'l. Enl. 543. f. 2.—TURT. Syst. 629.— PEALE'S Museum, No. 7637.

THIS appears to be the most sociable with its kind and the least intimate with man, of all our Swallows; living together in large communities of sometimes three or four hundred. On the high sandy bank of a river, quarry, or gravel pit, at a foot or two from the surface, they commonly scratch out holes for their nests, running them in a horizontal direction to the depth of two and sometimes three feet. Several of these holes are often within a few inches of each other, and extend in various strata along the front of the precipice, sometimes for eighty or one hundred yards. At the extremity of this hole a little fine dry grass with a few large downy feathers form the bed on which their eggs, generally five in number, and pure white, are deposited. The young are hatched late in May; and here I have taken notice of the common Crow, in parties of four or five, watching at the entrance of these holes, to seize the first straggling young that should make its appearance. From the clouds of Swallows that usually play round these breeding places, they remind one at a distance of a swarm of bees.

The Bank Swallow arrives here earlier than either of the preceding; begins to build in April, and has commonly two broods in the season. Their voice is a low mutter. They are particularly fond of the shores of rivers, and, in several places along the

LINN. Syst. 1, p. 344.-GMEL. Syst. 1, p. 1019.-L.ATH. Ind. Orn. 11, p. 575.

Ohio, they congregate in immense multitudes. We have sometimes several days of cold rain and severe weather after their arrival in spring, from which they take refuge in their holes, clustering together for warmth, and have been frequently found at such times in almost a lifeless state with the cold; which circumstance has contributed to the belief that they lie torpid all winter in these recesses. I have searched hundreds of these holes in the months of December and January, but never found a single Swallow, dead, living, or torpid. I met with this bird in con siderable numbers on the shores of the Kentucky river, between Lexington and Danville. They likewise visit the sea shore, in great numbers, previous to their departure, which continues from the last of September to the middle of October.

The Bank Swallow is five inches long, and ten inches in extent; upper parts mouse coloured, lower white, with a band of dusky brownish across the upper part of the breast; tail forked, the exterior feather slightly edged with whitish; lores and bill black; legs with a few tufts of downy feathers behind; claws fine pointed and very sharp; over the eye a streak of whitish; lower side of the shafts white; wings and tail darker than the body. The female differs very little from the male.

This bird appears to be in nothing different from the European species; from which circumstance, and its early arrival here, I would conjecture that it passes to a high northern latitude on both continents.

VOL. II.-3 H