HABITS AND MIGRATION OF THE SNOW BUNTING. 5 
dress from summer to winter, the head washed with fawn-colour, 
and each black feather on the back, between the scapulars, edged 
with a fringe of brownish white. Often, too, may be seen an old 
bird or two on the beach at.Spurn Point, searching the tide-wrack 
for insects, their presence only made apparent by the white flicker 
of wings as they shift their ground. 
The first. flocks, when they arrive early in November, consist 
mainly of the young of the year and a few females, rarely any 
old males. No two birds are exactly alike; and, when observed 
with a good glass at close range, each individual has a very curious 
appearance, as if the colours are laid on in stripes from the head 
to the tail, like the painted birds in a ‘‘ Noah's Ark.” Sometimes, 
with an increase or sudden outburst of very severe weather in 
Northern Europe later in the winter, a second migration of Snow 
Buntings is not infrequent ; these are mainly old birds, or contain 
a much larger proportion of old birds than are seen in the earlier 
immigrations, and doubtless are Snow Buntings which would never 
have come to us were it not for some strong impelling cause, as 
an advent of intensely severe weather on the Continent, exactly 
as such weather early in the year will cause a sudden influx of 
old Fieldfares and Blackbirds with yellow bills. 
On their first arrival Snow Buntings feed mainly on the 
seeds of such salt-loving plants as Schoberia maritima and Glaux 
maritima, and others; later, when dispersed over the marshes, 
they feed on the seeds of various field weeds and grasses. No 
small bird which frequents our bleak and inhospitable marshes 
is capable of withstanding such severe cold; for long after all 
other birds have been driven into the stack-yards, we hear their 
cheerful chirrup, and can watch them coursing over the hard 
frozen snow and picking the seeds from the withered bents which 
rise above the otherwise universal white. Asa rule, they prefer 
the neighbourhood of the coast, but I have occasionally seen 
flocks on the “wolds” some distance inland; and Mr. William 
Eagle Clarke informs me that in the severe winter of 1878-79 
a large flock came quite into the borough of Leeds, frequenting 
some rough ground adjoining one of the busiest manufacturing 
portions of the town. 
Examine them when we will, we rarely find a Snow Bunting 
anything but plump and fat, and under certain emergencies 
they are not to be despised on the table. Dr. Saxby narrates 
(Zool. 1871, p. 2535) that when, from the non-arrival of the 
