MOTACILLIDA, WAGTAILS.—GEN. 26. 89 
26. Genus EREMOPHILA Boie. 
Horned Lark. Shore Lark. In spring :—Pinkish-brown, brightest on 
rump, nape and wing coverts, thickly streaked with dusky; below, white, 
breast and sides shaded with the color of the back, chin, throat and super- 
ciliary line pale yellow, or yellowish-white ; a pectoral crescent and curved 
stripe under the eye, black; tail 
black, outer feathers white-edged 
and middle ones like the back. 
Tints extremely variable; young 
birds, and fall and winter specimens 
of the Atlantic States are plain 
grayish-brown, streaked with darker, 
below soiled whitish, and with the 
black markings of the head and 
breast obscure or wanting, though 
the yellow is usually bright—even 
more so than in spring. Length 7-74, wing 44, tail 22-3, tarsus %, hind 
claw 4-3, very slender and sharp. North America; in the east retires in 
spring beyond the United States, but in the west breeds on the plains much 
further south. Wruts., i, 85, pl. 5, f. 4; Nurr., i, 455; Aup., iii, 44, pl. 
USILS Tey. 2408) : ALPESTRIS. 
Var. corysoLe#maA. A rather smaller, brighter colored race, occurring in south- 
western United States and Mexico. It looks quite different at first sight, but is 
not distinguishable as a species by any definite or constant characters. Alauda 
rufa AUD., vii, 853, pl. 497; Bp., 403. The foregoing, with EL. peregrina, a South 
American species or variety, are the only American Alaudide. 
Fic. 32. Horned Lark. 
Family MOTACILLIDA. Wagtails. 
Bill shorter than the head, very slender, straight, acute, notched at tip. Rictus 
not evidently bristled. Primaries nine, of which the 1st is about as long as the 2d, 
and the first three, four or five, form the point; inner secondaries enlarged, the 
longest one nearly, or quite, equalling the primaries in the closed wing. Tail 
lengthened, generally about equalling the wing. Feet large; tarsus scutellate, 
longer than the middle toe and claw; inner toe cleft to the very base, but basal 
joint of outer toe soldered with the middle one; hind toe usually bearing a long 
and little curved claw. A pretty well defined group of one hundred, chiefly Old 
World, species, which may be termed terrestrial Sylvias, all living mostly on the 
ground, where they run with facility, never hopping like most Oscines. They are 
usually gregarious; are insectivorous and migratory. They have gained their 
name from the characteristic habit of moving the tail with a peculiar see-saw 
motion, as if they were using it to balance themselves upon unsteady footing. 
They may be distinguished from all the foregoing birds, except Alaudide, by 
haying only nine primaries ; and from all the following birds by haying long flow- 
ing inner secondaries; and from Alaudide, with which they agree in this respect, 
as well as in usually having a lengthened, straightish hind claw, by having the 
tarsal envelope as in Oscines generally, slender bill and exposed nostrils. Two 
KEY TO N. A. BIRDS. 12 
