192 THE BUNTINGS 



Furthermore, I believe that it has fallen to me (as doubtless to many 

 others) to see the actual origin of the habit or instinct in question. 



Meanwhile let us turn to the actions of the male blackheaded- 

 bunting, which may possibly give us a hint in another direction. He, 

 when disturbed in the neighbourhood of the nest, does not, like the 

 female, play his part on the ground, but flutters from bush to bush, 

 with fanned tail and apparently injured wings l (me gelahmten Fliigelri). 

 It seems clear that this also must be due to anxiety, yet these, strange 

 to say, are the bird's actions in courtship, and, moreover, he sings 

 now, as then. 2 The fact would seem to be that sudden excitement 

 demands movements of some sort, and that those come most readily 

 to hand which the bird, though under the influence of quite another 

 set of feelings, has been in the constant daily habit of going through. 

 Should there be any truth in this principle, we have here another 

 element that may enter into the origin of the movements we have 

 been discussing, as well as of some others which birds indulge in, the 

 meaning of which is not always apparent. 



Like the Finches proper, buntings, as a family, become more or 

 less gregarious after the nesting season is over, and may then often 

 be seen in company with other species, either of their own or alien 

 families. As with most birds, the development of the social principle 

 seems to vary with the country in which they find themselves, depend- 

 ing, no doubt, primarily, on their comparative numbers, and, to a 

 lesser extent, upon food conditions. Thus whilst, in various parts of 

 England, corn-buntings collect, in autumn, in fairly respectable 

 numbers at least in small flocks 3 and, in Scotland, during the 

 winter, in very large ones, which, however, would seem to be migra- 

 tory, 4 D'Urban and Matthew, in their Birds of Devon, tell us that they 

 have " never met with it in flocks, in the winter time, anywhere in the 

 western counties." In Ireland, also, their habits would seem to differ 

 in this respect, and they have only once been seen by Ussher 

 and Warren in a party of fifty or sixty. 5 In Savoy, however, these 



1 Naumann, Naturgeschichte der Vdgel Mitteleuropas, vol. iii. 2 Ibid. 



3 O. V. Aplin, Birds of Oxfordshire. 4 R. Gray, Birds of the West of Scotland. 



6 Birds of Ireland. 



