346 EMEERIZA 



Hob. Morocco, southern Algeria, and Tunis. 



In general habits it resembles E. striolata but is even more 

 tame and confiding, and frequents native houses, frequently 

 entering the rooms in search of food, and picking up crumbs 

 from the table. It feeds on insects, seeds, and any scraps it 

 can pick up about the native houses, and being protected by 

 the Arabs is even tamer than our Robin. It breeds in March 

 or April, and the nest, which is usually placed in a hole in a 

 wall or on a rafter, is constructed of fine twigs or sticks and 

 grass-bents lined with hair, cotton, or wool. The eggs, usually 

 3 in number, are white, finely spotted with brown, the spots 

 being usually more profuse at the larger end, often forming an 

 irregular band or zone, and are not unlike some varieties of the 

 egg of Passer domesticus. In size they average about 0*79 

 by 0-6. 



503. BLACK-HEADED BUNTING. 

 EMBERIZA MELANOCEPHALA. 



Emleriza melanocephala^ Scop. Ann. Hist. nat. p. 142 (1769) ; Naum. 

 iv. p. 227, Taf. 101, fig. 2 ; Gould, B. of E. iii. pi. 172 ; (id.) B. 

 of Asia, v. pi. 13 ; (Newton), ii. p. 64 ; Dresser, iv. p. 151 pi. 206 ;; 

 Sharpe, Cat. B. Br. Mus. xii. p. 503 ; Gates, F. Brit. Ind. Birds, ii. 

 p. 261 ; Saunders, p. 205 ; Lilford, iv. p. 34, pi. 18. 



Bruant crocote, French ; Zigolo capinero, Ital. ; Kappenammer 

 German ; Tschernogolovaia-ovsyanka, Russ. ; Gandam Hind. 



$ ad. (Asia Minor). Forehead, lores, below the eye, crown, and nape 

 deep black ; upper parts and lesser wing-coverts rich orange chestnut ; 

 under parts deep yellow ; remiges and rectrices blackish brown, the latter 

 and the primaries narrowly margined with dull white, the secondaries and 

 wing-coverts broadly margined with warm buffy white ; bill dark horn,, 

 yellowish flesh below ; legs fleshy brown ; iris dark brown. Culmen 

 0*65, wing 3'75, tail 3'15 tarsus 0'85 inch. The female is much less richly 

 coloured ; upper parts fulvous brown, the head and back streaked with 

 blackish brown, the crown and rump slightly washed with yellow ; under 

 parts fulvous white, the breast washed with ochraceous, and the abdomen 

 with yellow ; under tail-coverts yellow ; wings and tail as in the male but 

 paler. In the winter the rich colours in the male are obscured by the dull 

 pale margins to the feathers. 



Hob. South-eastern Europe as far west as Italy, a rare 

 straggler to France, Great Britain, and Heligoland ; eastward 

 through Asia Minor and Palestine to Persia and Baluchistan,, 



