132 THE SECOND BOOK OF BIRDS 
pretty little tufts of feathers that stand up on 
his head like horns, and the very long nail on 
his hind toe. 
Another way you may know this bird is that 
he lives on the ground, and never perches in a 
tree. Sometimes he gets up on a fence to sing, 
but he likes best to run along the road, or in a 
field, and he never — never hops. The place to 
look for him is a field or pasture, or on a country 
road. 
When insects are abroad, he eats the more 
dainty small ones, young grasshoppers and lo- 
custs before they get big and tough, small 
beetles and larve; and baby larks are fed on 
them. But he doesn’t starve when they are 
gone; he is fond of seeds of weeds and grasses. 
The nest of the horned lark is on the ground, 
and the little mother is very clever in hiding it, 
and not showing people where it is. Many birds, 
you know, will stay on the nest till one almost 
steps on them, and then fly up with a great fuss, 
thus telling their secret. When the wise little 
lark sees one coming, she quietly slips off her 
nest. Then she crouches to the ground, and 
creeps away. When she thinks she is far enough, 
she rises to her full height, and begins to eat, or 
to walk around as if she had nothing on her 
mind, and there were no such thing as a nest 
