588 THE BIRDS OF MANITOBA THOMPSON. 



down among tbe 20's below zero, and still the merry, rollicking snow- 

 birds roost ou the barn and twitter and eujoy life ; laugh and grow fat 

 they surely do. Many that I have taken at this season are like balls of 

 butter, and the clouds of blinding, biting, stinging snow that career over 

 the desolate plains seem no more to them than a summer zephyr. The 

 winter aspect of the prairie is dreary enough to our eyes. But wlien 

 the winter storm — the blizzard — arises, burying the laud in snowdrifts 

 and destroying life with a gale of wind chilled to 50 or GO degrees below 

 zero, it may well be wondered that the hardiest of animals are left alive, 

 so terrible is the power of this overwhelming torrent of snow. 



Then it may be asked, when the blizzard is over, was the snowbird 

 out in all this ? He was certainly not in ; and yet he was in, for his en- 

 emy is his friend. The deadly snow saved him alive from itself; he 

 was not killed, but buried. He had indeed descended into the grave to 

 save his life, for like several other birds thatbrave the northern winter, 

 he has learned to crouch duriug a snowstorm in some recess or hollow, 

 and his warm, protecting counterpane is the snow. 



It is said that no bird goes farther north than the Snow Bunting. With 

 him, if with any, is the secret of the Pole. In that desolate land where 

 higher beings can not live, the young snowbird is reared in peace, like 

 a frail flower springing up in the very cave of death. The sentiment 

 of the strange construction is fully illustrated by a sight recorded on 

 Southampton Island, by Captain Lyons, the explorer. Cold and hun- 

 ger had swept awa^^ a tribe of Esquimaux ; their bodies lay aoout what 

 was once a village ; on the shore, half buired by the sand, was the 

 the body of a child, and on its breast a snowbird had built its nest and 

 was rearing its young. 



These abundant winter birds arrive at Portage la Prairie about October 10; depart 

 usually about the middle of April. Their movements being influenced greatly by 

 the weatber, so long as the ground is covered with snow they will remain, but as 

 soon as the bare ground is visible they disappear. 



A few pairs may remain to breed with us, for ou the 23d of May, 1884, I surprised 

 a pair of them drinking out of a tub in my garden. The day was very warm, and after 

 they flew on the fence I noticed that they seemed oppressed with the heat ; their 

 bealis were held open as one sometimes sees our common birds holding theirs on hot 

 days in August. On the 22d day of June I saw one of the same pair or another bird 

 also in my garden eagerly hunting for food, but unfortunately I lost sight of it with- 

 out tracing it to its nest, if it had one. (Nash, in MSS.) 



183. Calcariu.s lapponicus. Lapland Longspur. 



Very abundant spring and fall migrant wlierever there is prairie or 

 cleared country. Mouse Eiver, October (Cones). Dufferin: Arrive be- 

 fore April 15 (Dawson). Winnipeg: Abundant migrant (Hine). Abun- 

 dant at Eat Portage, October, 1S86 (Thompson). Portage la Prairie: 

 Common in the spring; sometimes abundant in autumn (iNTash). Very 

 common on the plain at Fort Pelly, and on the road between Fort 

 Ellice and Brandon, during September and October (Macoun). Car- 



