FLYING SOUTH WITH THE BIRDS If the swallows can do it then so can I, they had vacated their black chimney nest back in early September and during a dull Breton summer there had been two casualties which I discovered on returning from the Outer Hebrides. My 17th century farm-house in Central Finistere has always been open to wildlife, bats lodge between the rafter, mice make their way through the meter thick walls, hornets have discovered the perfect void above the toilet dormer window, sparrows nest in the scaffold holes in gable end while toads find the damp mossy cool spots at the base, and each year swallows fight over who will take over the chimney nest. With all this wildlife there is inevitably death, I returned at the end of one summer to find a
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