MY heart lifts every year at roughly the same moment, though I can never quite predict the day.
It might be late April, sometimes early May. I’ll be hanging out washing, or standing at the sink with my hands in suds, when I hear it first — that high, excited scream, like joy being torn through the air at speed.
And then I look up and there they are. Swifts. Back.
Many have travelled from as far away as southern Africa. Don’t forget: migratory birds knew the world was round long before we did.
Before we knew that the world was a sphere, in olden times there were a variety of theories as to what happened to birds in the winter. One of the oldest ideas was that birds hibernated.
Aristotle, writing in the 4th century BC, believed swallows spent winter buried in mud at the bottom of rivers and lakes, or tucked into hollow trees. This idea lasted astonishingly long — well into the 18th century — and was repeated by respected naturalists.
Another belief was metamorphosis.
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