286 BIRDS OF THE ROCKIES 



semi-transparent, aspect. The bunting is about the size 

 of the eastern bobolink, and bears some resemblance to 

 that bird ; but bobolink he is not, although sometimes 

 mistaken for one, and even called by that name in Col- 

 orado. The fact is, those wise men, the systematists, 

 have decided that the bobolink belongs to the family 

 Icteridce, which includes, among others, the blackbirds 

 and orioles, while the lark bunting occupies a genus 

 all by himself in the family Frmgillidoe that is, the 

 family of finches, sparrows, grosbeaks, and towhees. 

 Therefore, the two birds can scarcely be called second 

 cousins. The bunting has no white or buff on his upper 

 parts. 



Sitting on a sunny slope one June evening, I surren- 

 dered myself to the spell of the bunting, and endeavored 

 to make an analysis of his minstrelsy. First, it must 

 be said that he is as fond as the bobolink of rehearsing 

 his arias on the wing, and that is, perhaps, the chief 

 reason for his having been mistaken for that bird by 

 careless observers. Probably the major part of his solos 

 are recited in flight, although he can sit quietly on a 

 weed-stalk or a fence-post and sing as sweetly, if not as 

 ecstatically, as if he were curveting in the air. During 

 this aerial performance he hovers gracefully, bending 

 his wings downward, after the bobolink's manner, as if 

 he were caressing the earth beneath him. However, a 

 striking difference between his intermittent song-flights 



