Xo. III. ORNITHOLOGY. 209 



had disappeared. The food of the snowy owl in Grinnell 

 Land appears to consist entirely of the lemming (My odes 

 torquatus). Hundreds of their cast pellets, which I picked 

 up and examined, consisted of the bones and fur of these 

 little animals ; and the stomachs of all I opened contained 

 the same. 



3. PLECTROPHANES NIVALIS. After passing the seventy- 

 eighth degree of north latitude the snow-bunting is not met 

 with in the same numbers as in the neighbourhood of the 

 Danish settlements of West Greenland, but it is dispersed 

 generally along the shores of Smith Sound and the Polar 

 Basin. On August 28, 1875, at Shift-Kudder Bay (lat. 

 81 52' N.), I observed a flock of about eighty, and another, 

 in which I counted over twenty birds, flying south. On 

 September 14, Lieutenant Parr met with a solitary individual 

 in lat. 82 35' N. ; and the last one I observed that season 

 flew past the ship on September 24. 



Next spring I first heard this bird when travelling on 

 May 13, 1876, in lat. 82 35' N. ; the following day I 

 observed one ; and after that day they were frequently met 

 with. On May 27, Lieutenant Parr, on his journey from 

 the north over the ice, saw a snow-bunting near to the 

 eighty-third degree. I found a nest of this species on June 

 24 (lat. 82 33' N.), containing four eggs, within twenty feet 

 of the nest of a snowy owl; it was neatly constructed of 

 grasses, and lined with the owl's feathers. On another 

 occasion I found a nest lined with the soft wool of the 

 musk-ox. 



4. CORVUS CORAX. A pair of ravens were observed by 

 Dr. Coppinger to be nesting in the cliffs of Cape Lupton 

 during the month of July. While this officer was detained 

 at Polaris Bay by the sickness of some of the sledge-crews, 

 he noticed these birds visit his camp daily in search of offal. 

 The raven was not observed by any of our Expedition along 

 the shores of the Polar Basin ; so that I consider Cape Lupton 

 (lat. 81 44' N.) the northernmost settlement of this species. 

 August 29, 1876, at Dobbin Bay (lat. 79 36' N.), a female, 



VOL. II. P 



