184! Scientific Proceedings, Royal Dublin Society. 



during October, frequenting long coarse grass and weeds, remote 

 from trees, among or on which I never knew it to alight. They 

 are difficult to obtain, as from the nature of their haunts it is 

 nearly impossible to catch a glimpse of them when at rest, and 

 even when forced to fly, which of itself is no easy matter, they 

 go but a few yards before droj^ping again into covert, among 

 which they either run off or conceal themselves so efiectually 

 as to elude the most careful search. Occasionally, however, if 

 perfect stillness be observed, they may be seen creeping up the 

 stems of the coarser plants, and examining them closely for the 

 small insects which form their principal food ; on one occasion I 

 found a grasshopper quite entire and so large that it seemed a 

 miracle how so tiny a thing could have captured and swallowed 

 it. I found these wrens more frequently upon the upper ridges 

 and slopes of the prairie than in the damp hollows. 



Anthus ludovicianus (Gmel.) American Pipit. — An abun- 

 dant winter visitor to the open districts, where it makes its 

 appearance in enormous flocks about the middle of October, but 

 soon breaking up into parties of from ten to twenty individuals, 

 they scatter themselves over the whole country, frequenting cul- 

 tivated and fallow fields, dry upland and low-lying damp prairie 

 indiscriminately; so they pass the time until February, when 

 they again gather in large and continually increasing numbers, 

 and resort to the newly-ploughed lands, where they prove of the 

 greatest service to the farmer by the destruction of the noxious 

 grubs and insects which he turns up ; in such places they remain 

 until about the second week in April, when they all suddenly 

 disappear. These pipits show no marked partiality for the 

 neighbourhood of water, nor did I ever see them wade into or 

 even feed along the edge of the prairie pools, but, on the con- 

 trary, they seem to prefer, if anything, a dry sandy or gravelly 

 soil. Their movements on the ground and on the wing, as well 

 as their peculiar, short circular flight while singing, are exactly 

 similar to those of our common British species, as also is their 

 call-note, uttered when rising. They are very much given to 

 alighting on trees, especially in the morning and evening, so that 

 1 have frequently killed several at a shot, and indeed I have so 

 often observed flocks upon solitary trees at so late an hour that I 

 believe that they intended to pass the night in that position. 



