120 SPRING. 



and the immediate vicinity of houses, woods, and 

 coppices. The small annual weeds that ripen their 

 seeds upon stubble after the crops are removed, are 

 its favourite food. It runs along and picks them 

 from the husks, and 'sometimes scrapes for them 

 with its claws ; and then in winter it shifts its 

 quarters. From .September to February, the time 

 that they are mute, they collect in vast masses ; and 

 have a partial migration. The extent of that migra- 

 tion is not very well understood ; because the wide 

 dispersion of the birds in single pairs during the 

 breeding season, and the great accumulation in one 

 place for the remainder of the year, give it an ap- 

 pearance of being greater than it really is. Their 

 habits, which are always those of free range, whe- 

 ther in the air or upon the ground, necessarily make 

 them shift their quarters when the snow is so deep 

 as to cover the tops of the herbaceous plants ; but 

 even in winter they are not partial to sea side places. 

 The safety of the lark from birds of prey consists 

 in the closeness with which it can lie, and the simi- 

 larity of its colour to that of the clods. It is said 

 to assume the surface and tint of a heap of wet mud 

 by ruffling its plumage. When in the air it is ge- 

 nerally above those birds that beat the bushes ; and 

 if they attempt to approach it, it does not come down 

 in the parabola, which is its usual form of path for 

 alighting, but drops perpendicularly, like a stone, and 

 sometimes stuns itself by the fall. On these occasions, 

 too, it will fly toward any open door, or dash itself 

 against the glass of a window. It has less fear of 

 man than many of the little birds ; and, from the glee 



