SNOW-BUNTING. 459 



familiar, and occasionally, even at this season, they 

 chant out a few unconnected notes as they survey the 

 happier face of nature. At the period of incubation they 

 are said to sing agreeably, but appear to seek out the 

 most desolate regions of the cheerless north in which to 

 waste the sweetness of their melody, unheard by any ear 

 but that of their mates. In the dreary wastes of Green- 

 land, the naked Lapland Alps, and the scarcely habita- 

 ble Spitzbergen, bound with eternal ice, they pass the 

 season of reproduction, seeking out the fissures of rocks 

 on the mountains in which to fix their nests, about the 

 month of May or June. The exterior of this fabric is 

 made of dry grass, with feathers, and the lining is usu- 

 ally obtained from the scattered down of the Arctic Fox. 

 The eggs are said to be 5, obtuse, whitish, marked with 

 numerous spots of brown and grey. A few are known 

 to breed in the alpine declivities of the White Mountains 

 of New Hampshire. The nest is here fixed on the ground 

 in the shelter of low bushes, and formed nearly of the 

 same materials as that of the Common Song-Sparrow.* 

 In Europe these birds sometimes migrate in winter in 

 such numbers into Sweden, Siberia, Russia, and the 

 Scottish Highlands, as nearly to cover the country for a 

 great extent. They are less numerous in Britain, and 

 chiefly remain in the North ; they also visit Germany, 

 Holland, France, and some parts of Italy. At times 

 they proceed as far south in the United States as the 

 state of Maryland. They are here generally known by 

 the name of the White Snow-bird, to distinguish them 

 from the more common dark-bluish Sparrow, so called. 

 They vary in their color, acccording to age and season, 



* For this interesting information, I am indebted to Wright Boott, Esq. who acci- 

 dentally found a nest of this species, about the middle of July (1831), then containing 

 young. 



