450 INSECTIVOROUS BIRDS, 



Genus. — ANTHUS. (Larks of Lin.) 



In these birds the bill is straight, slender, cylindric, and subulate 

 towards the point, with the edges somewhat inflected towards the 

 middle, and at the base destitute of bristles; the base of the upper 

 mandible carinated, with the point slightly notched and declining. 

 Nostrils basal, lateral, half closed by a membrane. Feet slender; 

 tarsus longer than the middle toe ; inner toe free ; hind toe shortest 

 with the nail almost always long, and somewhat straight. — Wings 

 moderate, no spurious feather; 1st, 2d, and 3d primaries longest; 

 secondaries notched at tip ; 2 of the scapulars nearly equal to the 

 longest primaries. Tail rather long and emarginate. 



The female and young are usually much like the adult male, 

 who assumes somewhat more brilliant colors only during a few 

 days of the breeding season. The moult is annual. — These birds 

 have many of the habits of the Wagtails and also of the Larks ; they 

 sing when rising on the wing in the same manner as the latter. 

 They live habitually on the ground in open places, in fields, and 

 along the gravelly borders of streams and other bodies of water ; 

 while thus employed in collecting their sole insect food, they keep 

 their tails vertically moving like the Motacillas ; they also nest on 

 the ground, and most of the species never alight on trees. The spe- 

 cies, though few, are spread over the whole globe. ^' 



BROWN OR RED LARK. 



{Anihus spinoletta, Bonap. A. aquaticus, Audubon, pi. 10. Orn. 

 Biog. i p. 49. Mauda rufa, Wilson, v. p. 89. pi. 42. fig. 4. 

 [young.] Phil. Museum, No. 5138.) 



Sp. Charact. — Beneath and line over the eye white ; breast and 

 flanks spotted with blackish ; tail-feathers nearly black, the outer 

 one half white, upon the 2d and often upon the .3d, a conic white 

 spot ; hind nail long and curved. — Female more spotted below. 

 — Young dark-brown inclining to olive, with blackish-brown 

 spots ; line over the eye and beneath pale yellowish rufous, the 

 breast strongly spotted. — The old male, for a short time in the 

 breeding season, is below of a pale rufous rose-color. 



This is a winter bird of passage in most parts of the 

 United States, arriving in loose, scattered flocks from the 

 North, in the Middle and Eastern States, about the sec- 



