468 PLECTROPHANES NIVALIS. 



breast, and the sides, reddish-browii ; the sides of the baud 

 under the edge of the wing brownish-black. 



Female. — The female has the head and cheeks of a lighter 

 chestnut, the hind-neck more grey, the upper parts with 

 brownish-grey in place of reddish margins. The small wing- 

 coverts are blackish-brown, the first row broadly tipped with 

 greyish- white. The secondary coverts only tipped with white. 

 There is much less white on the quills, the secondaries having 

 all a large proportion of brownish-black. Only two of the tail- 

 feathers on each side have white, the next being generally only 

 paler on the inner web. The lower parts are light grey or 

 greyish -white, with a band of reddish-brown on the fore part of 

 the breast, the lateral feathers of this band streaked with dusky. 



In this state the bird is the Mountain Bunting of Montagu. 

 His Tawny Bunting is the present species adult in winter 

 plumage. 



Remarks. — ^lontagu having remarked that " so rarely does 

 the Snow Bunting migrate to the southern parts of England, 

 that in the many years we have attended to the subject, no one 

 instance has occurred,""* and that the Tawny Bunting is by no 

 means so rare there as either the Snow Bunting or the Moun- 

 tain Bunting, various persons have forthwith asserted that the 

 males of the species here described are rarely met with in the 

 south, although the females and young are not unfrequent 

 there. They forget that by " Snow Bunting"" JNIontagu means 

 the bird in its summer plumage. In all parts of Scotland, the 

 flocks that I have met with had their due proportion of adult 

 males and females, unless the season be advanced, in which 

 case the males are diminished, simply by being shot on account 

 of their superior beauty. Montagu states among other reasons 

 for separating the young and old of this species, that the second 

 quill is the longest in the Tawny Bunting, while in the Moun- 

 tain Bunting the two first are nearly the longest. Now, it 

 does happen that these feathers vary in length, but not as 

 stated, the first sometimes being longest in both. Thus of 

 eight " skins,"" which I have preserved in memorial, six have 

 the first quill decidedly longest, one has the second longest, and 

 the eighth has the first but very slightly longer than the second. 



