84 Older I 



neck; otherwise the bird is chiefly brown, while the 

 female is much plainer brown. As its breeding haunts, 

 though circumpolar, are in the Arctic and Subarctic 

 countries, the eggs were for long rare in collections ; 

 they are richly spotted with brown and are laid in 

 a grassy nest warmly hned with feathers, which is 

 placed on a dry spot in a marsh — commonly to the 

 north of the tree limit — in a willow swamp or similar 

 place. The song is said to resemble that of the Linnet. 

 The Snow Bunting {Plectrophenax nivalis), also an 

 inhabitant of the more Arctic regions of both worlds, as 

 well as Iceland and the Faeroes, is of particular interest 

 to British ornithologists, for not only do large numbers 

 visit us between October and April, but a good many 

 pairs are now known to breed at the tops of the loftiest 

 Scottish mountains. There the nest, of such substances 

 as can be procured, is placed deep among the boulders 

 of the " screes," but in the north of Europe it is often 

 more exposed and almost at sea level. The five 

 roundish white eggs are prettily marked with rust- 

 colour, brown and lilac. The song is more melodious 

 than in Buntings generally ; the flight is strong ; the 

 food consists of insects in summer, while in winter the 

 birds frequent our sea-side dunes, fields, and stack- 

 yards for the seeds and grain to be found there. The 

 cock is a beautiful white bird with black on the mantle, 

 tail and wings, which becomes chestnut in autumn ; he 

 is whiter again in winter, but the hen and the young, 

 are always much duller, the former being greyer with 

 blackish head. 



