Larks. 



Order, Passeres. 

 Family, Alaudidae. 



474b. PRAIRIE HORNED LARK. Octocoris alpestris praticola. 

 Length seven and one-half inches. Black line extending from sides of 

 mouth and black necklace. Back, pale wine-colored brown. Yellowish 

 white throat. Black tail, except in flight when white feathers are visi- 

 ble. Fast little roadrunner. Found by the roadside in the fields es- 

 pecially on the plains. 



What do you think of a little bird with horns? Do you think 

 that he must be very, very bad ? No so, for they are not real horns, 

 only some long feathers that stick up from the sides of his head 

 like feathers on a lady 's hat. The lady lark wishing perhaps, to set 

 the ladies of society a good example, never wears plumes even in her 

 Easter bonnet. It is only the gentleman lark that wears them, 

 but it may be that he belongs to some secret society and the plumes 

 are a part of his regalia and that may be the reason that he got the 

 name of "lark". 



It is April now, but they have already nested, not the meadow- 

 larks, for they are too busy giving concerts, but the horned-larks 

 that have spent the winter with us. He's the "early bird", but 

 he's too early for the worm. The sparrow-like nest and the spar- 

 row-like eggs and the sparrow-like bird would lead you to suspect 

 that he is a sparrow, but he is not. He is the first cousin and near- 

 est American relative of the European skylark, of which Shelley 

 sang: 



1 ' Higher still and higher, 



From the earth thou springest; 



Like a cloud of fire, 



The blue deep thou wingest, 



And singing still dost soar and soaring ever singest." 



Our horned-lark, it is said, often shows the family character- 

 istic by a song-flight, but while I have seen the flight, I have never 



