276 BRITISH BIRDS. 
northerly current breaks on the east coast of England, and is visible to 
any observer who will take the trouble to visit the Sussex downs in October 
when the wind is blowing gently from the north. Strangers which visit 
us from South Europe arrive in spring, and are wanderers who have over- 
shot the mark in company with the birds which form the other great 
army of migrants which starts from Africa, and crossing the Mediterranean 
at Gibraltar, Malta, Cyprus, and other points, spreads over Europe and 
Western Asia, the left wing convergimg on the British Islands. The 
Short-toed Lark is an autumn visitor to our shores, and clearly belongs to 
the group of Eastern birds which reach us across the steppes of South 
Russia and South-western Siberia, where it is common. 
The Short-toed Lark is essentially a bird of the steppes ; and the drier 
and more sandy they are, the better it is pleased. It revels in the sand, 
and a bed of dry sand in which it may bathe in the dust is as essential 
to its happiness as is his morning tub to the modern English gentleman. 
It is a very common bird on the sandy plains between Athens and Mara- 
thon, where it may be seen in company with the Tawny Pipit and Cret- 
zschmar’s Bunting (the Grecian representative of the Ortolan), whilst 
grasshoppers abound on every side, and large green lizards flash past the 
traveller, and tortoises of all sizes creep slowly out of his way. I found it 
equally common on the steppes of the Dobrudscha, especially on the sandy 
plateau which rises gently behind Kustendji, where it shared the ground 
with Wheatears, Calandra Larks, and a few Crested Larks and Sky-Larks. 
It mounts into the air like the latter species, and sings its short mono- 
tonous song. Its call-note is similar to that of the Sky-Lark, but weaker 
and shriller. It is essentially a ground-bird, and runs along the sandy 
plains with great quickness; and though the Sky-Lark and the Calandra 
Lark are constantly seen perched on some thistle or tuft of tall herbage, I 
have never seen the Short-toed Lark otherwise than on the ground or on 
the wing. Its flight is very shghtly undulating, but is constantly imter- 
cepted with sudden bounds forward. It will sometimes perch on a stone, 
and I have seen it on the top of the earthworks thrown up by the Russians 
in the last Turkish war; but in spite of its short hind claw it does not 
perch on trees. Alexander von Homeyer says that in Majorca he has often 
heard it sing on the ground. Its food is said to be entirely small seeds ; 
but in summer it probably feeds also on insects. 
The Short-toed Lark arrives at its breeding-grounds in Greece and 
Asia Minor early in April, and I have taken its eggs in the Parnassus on 
the 11th of May, but in uke Dobrudscha it breeds at least a month later. 
I was surprised to find nearly all the small birds breeding very late in the 
valley of the Lower Danube; and Dixon noticed the same of the smaller 
Algerian birds. 
