The Lapland Buxtixg 133 



between the sexes.* The song is generally' heard when the bird is fl\"ing in the 

 air, soaring like a Lark, and is continued until the bird alights on some grassy 

 knoll or stunted bush, descending with outspread wings and tail. What I take 

 to be the alarm-note of this bird is a plaintive but loud iltct'-up, often heard near 

 its nest. The female has a song almost as rich as that of the male. The Laj^land 

 Bunting is not such a coast bird as the Snow-Bunting, and seeks the swampiest 

 groiind it can find so long as there are dr}' tussocks of grass full of flowers where 

 it can breed; if there are also a few stunted willows or birches upon which it can 

 perch, so much the better. The nest is almost always placed in some hole in the 

 side of one of the little mounds or tussocks which abound on the marsh}- parts of 

 the tundra; it is composed of dry grass and roots, and profusel}- lined with feathers. 

 The eggs of the Lapland Bunting are from four to six in number, and differ very 

 much both in size and colour. They vary in ground-colour from pale gre}' to pale 

 brown, more or less obscured by a profusion of iinderlying blotches and streaks, 

 which var}' in colour from yellowish-brown to reddish- brown ; the overlying 

 markings are generally much fewer, and are principally streaks mixed with a few 

 blotches and spots of dark reddish-brown." (Hist. British Birds, Vol. IL pp. 132, 



Herr Gatke states that this species, in its character, "is altogether unlike the 

 Snow-Bunting, having nothing of the boisterousness and wilduess of that species, 

 but being of a gentle and quiet disposition. Indeed, I have frequently for 3'ears 

 kept it confined in a cage, and its melodious, if somewhat melanchol}^, tune has 

 given me much enjoyment during many a summer night spent at my desk over 

 these pages. The song of the Snow- Bunting has exactly the same character; but 

 the melodious, flute-like notes are fuller, and the bird in confinement will onlj^ 

 give utterance to them during the first hours of June and July nights. The Snow- 

 Bunting remains, however, so utterly intractable, crying like one possessed when 

 any person approaches its cage, that it is impossible to make friends with it, and 

 one generally ends by once more giving the peevish fellow his liberty. 



The Lapland Bunting, on the other hand, ceases fluttering after one or two 

 weeks confinement if one keeps renewing its food, and soon becomes so tame that 

 it will take flies from the fingers. It also invariably accomplishes its autumn 

 moiilt to perfection, and in a very short time." (Birds of Heligoland, pp. 385-386.) 



Stevenson's experience of this species as a cage-bird seems to have been much 

 the same as Gatke's; he says: — "Unlike most birds when first confined in a cage, 

 it seemed perfectly at home, feeding readily on the seed placed for it, and both 



* If, however, as is now Reuerally believed, the songs of birds are snug in rivalry, this note would probably 

 represent the chink of the Chaffinch, or the zshiveeo of the Greenfinch, and would 1)e a note of defiance.— A. G.B. 



Vol. II. M2 



