PERISOREUS INFAUSTUS. 485 



wood about two hundred fathoms above his garth. He hewed down 

 a little spruce-fir, and when he began to debranch it he saw two small 

 eggs lie on the snow. So thought he to himself, Whence came 

 they ? And when he began to look round, he saw a nest among the 

 branches, and he saw also that Kuuki sat fast on the nest [though] 

 the tree was on the ground, and when he drove her oflP there were 

 still two eggs in the nest"\ Peck [i.e. Peter] has himself since 

 told me the same story. Both before and after he looked much for 

 Kuukainen's nests, and Ludwig and Anton were for weeks almost 

 constantly searching for them about Muoniovaara without success. 

 In the beginning of the summer Peck found a nest, from which the 

 young birds had just flown, in a tree against which he had laid a 

 pile of wood, just when the eggs must have been laid. 



§ 2610. Four. — Modas-jiirwi, April-May, 1856. 



0. W. tab. xiii. fiff. 5. 



§ 2611. T/iree. — Modas-jarwi, April -May, 1856. 



Knoblock^s entry is: — "5 May. Johan Modasjarwi brought two 

 Kukki'% nests. In the one there were three eggs, and in the other 

 four eggs. Both found near his house, and when he found that in 

 which there were four eggs, Kukki sat upon the nest, and he took 

 her fast by the back, and cast her down from it. He thouglit that 

 she was already brooding the eggs, but when he looked into the nest 

 there was not any egg in it. So he thought she would now assuredly 

 leave the nest, but when he went the next morning she had laid 

 an egg." 



These seven eggs were mixed together, but there is no difficulty in 

 separating them with certainty. The four eggs have a darker 

 ground-colour, a fainter character of spots, and especially arc of a 

 more obtuse form at the smaller end than the three. Of these latter 

 one is a remarkable Jackdaw-like variety. 



1 [This passage is copied by Mr. Wolley in tlie original Swedish, which I have 

 tried to render as literally as possible. Kitukainen, the common Finnish name for 

 this species, is often spoken of as KuuM, Kukki, or Kokki — the word being used lilie 

 a personal name, as, in English, Reynard is for Fox. The familiar nature of tlie 

 bird, so well known to those naturalists, Irom Linnfeus downward, who have made 

 it.s acquaintance, is sutHcient explanation of this fact. — Ed.'J 



PART II. 2 K 



