WHITE-WINGED CROSSBILLS. 39 



the port of Yarmouth, and was bought alive by Mr. G. H. Gurney in 

 October 1872. Gray, in his 'Birds of the West of Scotland/ mentions a 

 specimen shot, in February 1841, near Jedburgh, and also the occurrence 

 of a great number, " twelve or fifteen years ago," at sea, seen by Dr. Dewar 

 " crossing the Atlantic before a stiff westerly breeze." Many alighted on 

 the steamer when about 600 miles east of Newfoundland, and several were 

 captured and brought to this country. In addition to these occurrences, 

 Saxby, in his ' Birds of Shetland/ states that he shot two Crossbills at 

 Halligarth on the 4th of September 1859, which he refers to the American 

 species. 



The European White-winged Crossbill appears to have a somewhat more 

 northerly breeding-range than the Common Crossbill. Henke records it 

 as a common resident near Archangel, and it probably breeds in the 

 Urals. Middendorff says that it is especially common in the valley of the 

 Yenesay, and was the only Crossbill observed between lat. 63 and the 

 Arctic circle. Dybowsky is satisfied that it breeds in the mountains near 

 Lake Baikal ; Middendorff met with it on the Pacific coast in lat. 55, in 

 June. In winter it wanders into South Sweden, Denmark, Poland, Ger- 

 many, and has been recorded from Holland, Normandy, Switzerland, the 

 Tyrol, Lombardy, and Hungary. 



The A merican White-winged Crossbill breeds across that continent from 

 Alaska to Labrador. It has been obtained in Greenland, and occasionally 

 winters in the northern States. It has never been found in Europe, 

 except in the British Islands, and possibly in Heligoland. 



The history of the White-winged Crossbill, so far as it is known, is a 

 repetition of that of the Common Crossbill. Like its near ally, it is a 

 very early breeder, and collects into flocks in summer, which wander south 

 in winter. It feeds principally on the cones of larch and spruce, but in 

 confinement is very fond of apples. In a cage they are described as 

 clinging to the sides and top with their feet, and as apparently enjoying to 

 walk with their heads downwards. Both male and female sing well; 

 their note is said to be very plaintive, and to resemble the call of the 

 Bullfinch. 



Very little appears to be known respecting the nidification of this bird. 

 A nest of the American form, obtained by Dr. A. Adams at Fredericton, 

 New Brunswick, in 1868, is described by Messrs. Baird, Brewer, and 

 Ridgway as ' ' deeply saucer-shaped, and composed of a rather thin wall of 

 fibrous pale-green lichens encased on the outside with spruce-twigs and 

 thinly lined with coarse hairs and shreds of inner bark. Its external 

 diameter is a little less than four inches, the rim being almost perfectly 

 circular ; the cavity is an inch and a half deep by two and a half broad. 

 The one egg is pale blue, the large end rather thickly spattered with 

 black and ashy lilac, is regularly or rather slightly elongate oval, the 



