88 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. 
Europe where they are also found in great numbers in winter, they 
go by the name, among the Swedes, of “ Illwarsfogel” or bad 
weather birds ! 
The time of their arrival here varies with the character of the 
weather. In very cold winters I have seen them as early as 10th 
and 15th of December, and J have known them to remain in some 
seasons as late as the first week in March. They are said to make 
their appearance in Hudson’s Bay at the end of March or early in 
April remaining there for a few weeks and then wending their way 
still further north to breed on the shores of Greenland or even 
desolate Spitzbergen! As the food’ of these birds consists almost 
entirely of seeds of various wild plants, their means of subsistence 
amidst the deep snows of winter would seem to be precarious enough. 
Nevertheless they become very fat, and in the Province of Quebec, 
where they are found in much greater numbers than here, they are 
slaughtered most mercilessly for the market, and among our French 
friends “‘snowbirds on toast,” I am sorry to say, form a standing 
entree in the bill of fare of a fashionable dinner. 
The snowy owl, Nyctea Scandiaca, one of the most beautiful of 
our rapacious birds, is another winter visitor, at one time very com- 
mon even in this neighborhood. I have seen them in considerable 
numbers on the Island on the other side of our Toronto Bay in the 
months of December and January. Nothing can exceed the exqui- 
site softness and beauty of their thick, warm plumage, which enables 
them to bid defiance to the severest cold, and as they are not over- 
nice in their choice of food, rats, mice, fish and small birds, all seem- 
ing to come alike, they are in no danger of starving even in the most 
wintry weather. 
During this and the next month when strolling through the park 
or even through some of our streets, where bordered by trees or 
gardens, the attention of the passer-by may sometimes be attracted 
by the very sweet and melodious call-notes of two or three handsome 
birds, busily engaged in feeding upon the tender buds of a maple or 
stripping off the berries of the mountain ash, and if his curiosity 
induces him to approach them more closely (and they are often ex- 
tremely tame and fearless) he cannot but be struck with the beauty 
of the plumage of some of the number, the head and upper part of 
the breast and back of the male birds more especially being beauti- 
fully marked with delicate shades of orange and crimson. These 
Se 
