PINE-BUNTING. 79 



eggs is the usual number. They are brownish or purplish white 

 in ground colour, and more or less profusely lined with irregular 

 fine or fairly thick markings (Plate 41) ; these have given rise 

 to two popular names — " Writing Lark " and " Scribbling Lark." 

 An old Lancashire man assured me a cryptic message was 

 inscribed by the bird which, interpreted, read, " Don't take my 

 eggs." Two or even more broods are reared ; the first eggs are 

 laid towards the end of April, but young are often in the nest in 

 September, and I have known fresh eggs in the latter half of 

 October. The male helps in incubation, and parent birds, when 

 the young are hatched, will tumble about on the ground to draw 

 attention from the nest. 



The plumage of the males varies greatly in the extent and 

 depth of the yellow, apparently with age, but birds exhibiting 

 but little will mate. In the breeding season the head, throat 

 and under parts are bright lemon or canary-yellow, the back, 

 mantle and rump orange-rufous to chestnut. The head and 

 throat are streaked with dusky brown, and the back and flanks 

 with rich brown. The bill is brown above and bluish horn 

 below ; the legs and irides brown. The female is a browner 

 yellow, more striated on the head and under parts, and she has 

 a distinct moustachial stripe. Pale tips and edges obscure and 

 dull the plumage after the autumn moult, but by spring these 

 have worn away. The young are at first like the female, but 

 the males, after the first moult, show yellow on the head, though 

 for a year the streaks are pronounced. Length, 67 ins. Wing, 

 3*25 ins. Tarsus, 7 in. 



Pine-Bunting. Emberiza letuocephala Gmelin. 



The Pine-Bunting, a Siberian species which has occasionally 

 migrated into Europe in winter, was added to the British list 

 by the capture of an example at Fair Island, during a "rush" 

 of migrants, in October, 1911. The male has the crown, a line 



