2-752-455 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

'Swallows' Cave, Nahant', 1874. Tourists at the Nahant peninsula, near Boston, Massachusetts, USA. 'The Swallows' Cave...is a long, gloomy cavern, overhung by a dome of irregular strata, heaved together in strange, shelving layers. The cave is eight feet high and seventy long, and derives its name from its having long been occupied by colonies of swallows, which built their nests in its sombre crevices, and flew in and out in fluttering multitudes. But the invasion of their retreat by curiosity-seekers has expelled them thence. The cave may be entered for some distance by a row-boat; and here is a favorite cool haunt in the hot summer days, when the beaches are insufferable'. From "Picturesque America; or, The Land We Live In, A Delineation by Pen and Pencil of the Mountains, Rivers, Lakes...with Illustrations on Steel and Wood by Eminent American Artists" Vol. II, edited by William Cullen Bryant. [D. Appleton and Company, New York, 1874]