to secure her broods from rapacious birds, and
particularly from owls, which frequently fall down chimneys, perhaps in
attempting to get at these nestlings.

The swallow lays from four to six white eggs, dotted with red specks; and
brings out her first brood about the last week in June, or the first week
in July. The progressive method by which the young are introduced into
life is very amusing: first, they emerge from the shaft with difficulty
enough, and often fall down into the rooms below: for a day or so they
are fed on the chimney-top, and then are conducted to the dead leafless
bough of some tree, where, sitting in a row, they are attended with great
assiduity, and may then be called _perchers_. In a day or two more they
become _flyers_, but are still unable to take their own food; therefore
they play about near the place where the dams are hawking for flies; and,
when a mouthful is collected, at a certain signal given, the dam and the
nestling advance, rising towards each other, and meeting at an angle; the
young one all the while uttering such a little quick note of gratitude
and complacency, that a person must have paid very little regard to the
wonders of Nature that has not often remarked this feat.

The dam betakes herself immediately to the business of a second brood as
soon as she is disengaged from her first; which at once associates with
the first broods of house-martins; and with them congregates, clustering
on sunny roofs, towers, and trees. This hirundo brings out her second
brood towards the middle and end of August.

All the summer long is the swallow a most instructive pattern of
unwearied industry and affection; for from morning to night, while there
is a family to be supported, she spends the whole day in skimming close
to the ground, and executing the most sudden turns and quick evolutions.
Avenues, and long walks, under hedges, and pasture-fields, and mown
meadows where cattle graze, are her delight, especially if there are
trees interspersed; because in such spots insects most abound. When a
fly is taken a smart snap from her bill is heard, resembling the noise at
the shutting of a watch-case: but the motion of the mandibles is too
quick for the eye.

The swallow, probably the male bird, is the _excubitor_ to house-martins,
and other little birds, announcing the approach of birds of prey. For as
soon as a hawk appears, with a shrill alarming note he calls all the
swallows and martins