42 BRITISH BIRDS. 



wanders into the northern States in winter. In the Old World it winters 

 in South Scandinavia, Denmark., and South Siberia, and occasionally 

 throughout North Germany. It has also occurred at this season in 

 Holland, France, Bohemia, and Hungary. In the Himalayas the Pine- 

 Grosbeak is represented by a much smaller species, Loxia subhimachalus, 

 which differs in being smaller, richer-coloured, and in having no white on 

 the wing. 



The summer home of the Pine-Grosbeak is a very picturesque country. 

 Almost all the forest districts of Siberia are hilly, and in the north as the 

 trees become smaller they are also more thinly scattered over the ground, 

 and the interminable extent of wood is broken by occasional flat open 

 marshes, which become gay with flowers as soon as the snow melts. The 

 scenery is more park-like than further south, and birds are much more 

 plentiful and more easily seen. 



The Pine-Grosbeaks arrive at their breeding-grounds in small flocks in 

 April, and continue to be gregarious until summer comes, when they 

 disperse for the purpose of building their nests. They appear to be some- 

 what shy and retiring birds, because they do not frequent the roads like 

 the Bullfinches, the Snow-Buntings, and the Mealy Redpoles, who feed 

 largely on the droppings of the horses ; but this is by no means the case ; 

 they confine themselves principally to the woods, where they are not diffi- 

 cult to approach, even when the sportsman is obliged to hunt them in 

 snow-shoes six feet long to support his weight on the untrodden surface. 

 In the large pine-forests they prefer the banks of the rivers or the out- 

 skirts of some open place, and may often escape detection from their habit 

 of frequenting the tops of the trees. On the Arctic circle many of the trees 

 are small, and on the hilly ground they are scattered in small clumps, or 

 sometimes in isolated trees, the drooping boughs of the spruce-firs looking 

 very graceful on the white snow. In places like these the Pine-Grosbeak 

 may often be seen perched conspicuously on the top of a spruce-fir twenty 

 or thirty feet from the ground, but looking so much like the last spike of 

 the tree as frequently to escape notice. The first time that Harvie-Brown 

 and I met with these birds in the valley of the Petchora was on the 24th 

 of May, eight days after our arrival, in lat. 65^. They had probably been 

 there some weeks, as in the valley of the Yenesay I found them on the 23rd 

 of April in lat. 66^, and was assured by the sailors that they had been in 

 the forests a long time. We had no difficulty in shooting as many as we 

 required, and once as we were lunching under the shade of a spruce-fir 

 one or two of these fine birds came close to us. We generally saw them 

 on or near the tops of the trees ; but on one occasion we shot one from a 

 fallen tree stump. They very rarely visit the ground ; but I once saw one 

 hopping along like a Thrush under a fir tree. The call-note is a plaintive 

 single note somewhat like that of our Bullfinch, but incapable of being 



