640 ALAUDIM. 



some parts of Greece, though in Turkey it is hut a summer- 

 visitor. It prohahly occurs in Southern Russia, but in that 

 country generally its place is taken by another species 

 C. pispoletta (Pallas), which ranges thence to China and is to 

 be distinguished, among other features, by its spotted breast 

 and much shorter tertials. Both species however occur in 

 Persia and India, but returning westward G. brachydactyla 

 is found in Asia Minor and Palestine, to the exclusion appa- 

 rently of the other, and is there a summer-migrant, though 

 Canon Tristram believes that on the slopes of the Lebanon 

 and Mount Hermon there is a resident form which he has 

 separated by the name of C. hermonensis a distinction not 

 allowed by Mr. Dresser. The ordinary Short-toed Lark 

 occurs in Arabia and on the shores of the Red Sea, proceed- 

 ing in autumn up the valley of the Nile as far as Sennaar 

 and Kordofan, where in winter it collects in enormous 

 flocks. 



The food of this bird seems to consist almost exclusively 

 of small seeds, the husk of which it has the faculty of 

 breaking in its bill, but one may presume that insects of 

 some sort are supplied to the young. On the ground it 

 runs quickly and is especially fond of grovelling in sand. 

 When at large it never perches on shrubs or bushes, 

 though in confinement, like the Skylark, it will readily take 

 to a perch. The cock is said to have a lively song given on 

 the wing both morning and evening, but seldom in the mid- 

 dle of the day, its flight and notes in some degree resembling 

 those of our own favourite songster, and the latter indeed 

 are by some accounted more melodious and agreeable. The 

 nest is formed of a few bits of grass, collected in a depres- 

 sion of the ground, often a horse's foot-print, and the eggs, 

 four or five in number, are of a french-white, generally 

 minutely freckled with pale hair-brown, but sometimes 

 blotched boldly with a deeper shade, and occasionally with 

 patches of pale lavender : they measure from '87 to *73 by 

 from *62 to *55 in. 



The male has the bill of a dull flesh- colour, darkest along 

 the culmen : irides olive-brown : each feather of the top of 



