I JO The Laplaxd Buxtixg 



The food consists chiefly of insects, their larvse, and small mollusca in snmmer, 

 but of seeds in winter : in confinement, however, very little insect food is necessary 

 to keep this bird in health. In October, 1888, I purchased my first male Reed- 

 Bunting from a catcher. I turned it into my largest covered aviary, where it 

 lived a perfectly inoffensive, though stupid and absolutely silent life until 1891 ; 

 the winter following the death of this bird my man caught a second (in company 

 with Skylarks) which also lived about three years, dying before its spring change 

 of plumage, whilst a third example was given to me and died more quickly. Not 

 one of these three birds ever uttered the slightest sound, nor have others which 

 I have owned more recentl3^ and although fairly tame they all showed a skulking 

 disposition, rarely appearing in the open part of the aviary excepting to feed, and 

 showing none of that somewhat sprightly activity which characterizes this species 

 in its wild state. As an aviary bird, I can, therefore, only recommend this 

 Bunting on account of its quiet beauty of plumage and absolute innocence. 



Family^FRINGILLID.'E. Subfamily— EMBERIZIN.F. 



The Lapland Bunting. 



CahdriKs /(ifpoiiiais, Lixx. 



INHABITS the greater part of the circumpolar regions, with the exception of 

 Iceland — to which it is only an occasional straggler from Greenland — and 

 Spitzbergen and Novaya Zemlya, whence it has not yet been recorded. It 

 is only at considerable elevations, such as the Dovre Fjeld, in Norway, that it is 

 found breeding to the south of the Arctic circle ; but east of the North Cape it 

 is common in Lapland, while in Northern Siberia it is extremely abundant, being, 



