The Swallow Book

We all know that swallows are special, right?  This is the book that tells us why.  Having collected “legends, fables, folk songs, proverbs, omens, and riddles of many lands,” Dr. Giuseppe Pitrè (21 December 1841–10 April 1916)—Italian folklorist, medical doctor, professor, and senator—explains why the swallow, of all birds, holds a special place in the hearts of men, women, and children around the world, such that many cultures are thrilled to have a swallow attach her nest to their house or barn.  Some cultures even allow the swallows to nest inside their homes, keeping a window open at all times for the little bird’s convenience.

The Swallow Book, translated from the Italian into English by Ada Walker Camehl and published originally in 1912, comprises slightly more than 20,000 words and comes with 71 black and white drawings.

Preparing old books for digital publication is a labor of love at Travelyn Publishing.  We hold our digital versions of public domain books up against any others with no fear of the comparison.  Our conversion work is meticulous, utilizing a process designed to eliminate errors, maximize reader enjoyment, and recreate as much as possible the atmosphere of the original book even as we are adding the navigation and formatting necessary for a good digital book.  While remaining faithful to a writer’s original words, and the spellings and usages of his era, we are not above correcting obvious mistakes.  If the printer became distracted after placing an ‘a’ at the end of a line and then placed another ‘a’ at the beginning of the next line (they used to do this stuff by hand you know!), what sort of mindless robots would allow that careless error to be preserved for all eternity in the digital version, too?  Not us.  That’s why we have the audacity to claim that our re-publications are often better than the originals.