LAPLAND LONGSPUR. 305 



unsettled parts of Maine, Michigan, and the Northwestern 

 Territories. Large flocks also at times enter the Union, and 

 contrary to their usual practice of resting and living wholly on 

 the ground, occasionally alight on trees. They leave the colder 

 Arctic deserts in the autumn, and are found around Hudson 

 Bay on their way to the South in winter, not making their 

 appearance there before November. Near Severn River they 

 haunt the cedar-trees, upon whose berries they now princi- 

 pally feed. They live in large flocks, and are so gregarious 

 that when separated from their own species, or in small par- 

 ties, they usually, in Europe, associate with the common Larks, 

 or, in America, they join the roving bands of Snow Birds. In 

 the fur countries they extend their migrations in the spring as 

 far as the 65 th parallel, where they were seen about Fort 

 Franklin by the beginning of May ; at this time they fed much 

 upon the seeds of the Alpine arbutus. They feed principally 

 on seeds, and also on grass, leaves, buds, and insects. They 

 breed on small hillocks, among moss and stones, in open 

 marshy fields, and the nest is thickly and loosely constructed 

 of moss and grass, and lined with a few feathers and deer's 

 hair. The Longspur, like the Lark, sings only as it rises in 

 the air, in which, suspended aloft, it utters a few agreeable and 

 melodious notes. 



The Longspur occurs in winter in South Carolina, Kentucky, 

 and Kansas, though it is not common south of about 40°. 



Of its song Mr. Hagerup writes to me: "It sounds best when 

 the bird, after mounting up in the sky, drops slowly to the earth 

 with extended wings. The song is not very long, but has a sweet, 

 flute-like tone, and though the melody is attractive, it is almost mel- 

 ancholy in its wild plaintiveness, — as, indeed, all the notes of this 

 species are." 



Note. — One example of the Chestnut-collared Longspur 

 {Calcarms ornattis) was captured in Massachusetts in 1876. The 

 usual range of this bird is limited to the Central Plains, — from 

 Texas to the Saskatchewan. 



Smith's Longspur (^Calcarius pictus), which occurs in the in- 

 terior, — breeding from the Great Slave Lake district to the Arctic 

 Ocean, — is found, in winter, in lUinois. 



VOL. L 2Q 



