36 GRAMINIVOR^E. 



fleetly, but never perch, for which indeed their feet are not 

 so well adapted. 



In the statements of authors, there is some confusion in 

 the accounts of the changes of plumage in the snow-bunting, 

 which probably arises from the late period of the season to 

 which it wears the winter plumage, and from the moult 

 being perhaps gradual. 



LAEK-HEELED BUNTING (JSmbertza colcarata). 



This species, which is spotted with black on a fawn or 

 straw-coloured ground, and has the throat and upper part of 

 the breast black in the male, has occurred in Britain as a 

 very rare straggler. It is, like the one last-mentioned, a 

 native of the far regions of the north ; and, in its native 

 locality, it is said to inhabit the heaths and grounds covered 

 with lichen. 



THE ORTOLAN (Eniberizci liortulana). 



This species, so well known, and so highly esteemed by 

 epicures in the south-east of Europe, has been noticed as a 

 straggler in the north of England ; but there are some doubts 

 of its appearance ; and, at all events, it has no character as a 

 .British bird, being at best merely a transient stray. 



SPARROWS (Pyrgita). 



The sparrows are sometimes classed with the finches, with 

 Avhich they certainly agree in many of their characters and 

 habits, but they differ in some others. Sparrows do not 

 flock, at least so much as the finches ; they have no song, 

 though abundance of clatter ; they have the conical bill of 

 the graminivorous birds, but they have it more decidedly 

 notched than almost any of the others, which agrees with 



