SORA—SPARROW 895 
SORA or SOREE, the name given in North America to a RAIL, 
Porzana carolina. 
SORE-FALCON or HAWK (Fr. sor or saure; Low Latin 
saurius), a bird of the first year that has not moulted, but properly 
applicable only to those species which in that condition have 
reddish plumage, and hence more often called “ Red Hawks.” The 
ordinary spelling “Soar” (as though from the French essorer and 
supposed Low Latin exawrare) is misleading, for the word has 
nothing to do with flight but only colour, and is apparently akin 
to “sorrel” applied to a horse. (Cf. Littré, sud voce. citt.) 
SOUTH-SOUTHERLY, one of the many names of the Long- 
tailed Duck. 
SPARLIN-FOWL, a name of the female or immature Goos- 
ANDER, as old as Willughby’s time but apparently now obsolete. 
Sparlin or Sparling is a local name of the Fish more commonly 
called Smelt, Osmerus eperlanus. 
SPARROW (A.-S. Spearwa ; Icel. Spérr; Old High Germ. Sparo 
and Sparwe), a word perhaps (like the equivalent Latin Passer) 
originally meaning almost any small bird, but gradually restricted in 
signification and nowadays in common English applied to only four 
kinds, which are further differentiated as Hedge-Sparrow, House- 
Sparrow, Tree-Sparrow and Reed-Sparrow—the last being a 
BUNTING (p. 61)—though when used without a prefix the second 
of these is usually intended. 
1. The Hepcr-Sparrow, called DUNNOCK in many parts of 
Britain, the Accentor modularis of ornithologists, is the little brown- 
backed bird with an iron-grey head and neck that is to be seen in 
nearly every garden throughout the country, unobtrusively and 
yet tamely seeking its food, which consists almost wholly of insects, 
as it progresses over the ground in short jumps, each movement 
being accompanied by a slight jerk or shuffle of the wings, and 
_ hence another local name, SHUFFLEWING. Though on the Continent 
it regularly migrates, it is one of the few soft-billed birds that 
reside throughout the year with us, and is one of the earliest 
breeders,—its well-known greenish-blue eggs, laid in a warmly- 
built nest, being recognized by hundreds as among the surest signs 
of returning spring ; but a second or even a third brood is produced 
later. The cock has a sweet but rather feeble song ; and the species 
has long been accounted, though not with accuracy, to be the most 
common dupe of the Cuckow. Several other species are assigned to 
the genus Accentor ; but all, except the Japanese A. rubidus, which is 
the counterpart of the British Hedge-Sparrow, inhabit more or less 
taken the particulars of the last three birds above mentioned, Parra jacana, 
Aramides ypecaha and Vanellus cayennensis, all of them being therein figured, 
