212 SNOW BUNTING. 
seemed nowise appreénsive at my approach. I soon secured the 
whole; from the best of which the drawing in the plate was carefully 
made. On dissection, I found their stomachs occupied by a few spi- 
ders and the aurelie of some insects. I could perceive no difference 
between the plumage of the male and female. 
The Canada Jay is eleven inches long, and fifteen in extent ; back, 
wings, and tail, a dull, leaden gray,, the latter long, cuneiform, and 
tipped with dirty white ; interior vanes of the wings, brown, and also 
partly tipped with white; plumage of the head, loose and prominent ; 
the forehead, and feathers covering the nostril, as well as the whole 
lower parts, a dirty brownish white, which also passes round the bot- 
tom of the neck like a collar; part of the crown and hind head, black; 
bill and legs, also black; eye, dark hazel. The whole plumage on 
the back is long, loose, unwebbed, and in great abundance, as if to 
protect it from the rigors of the regions it inhabits. 
A gentleman of observation, whé resided for many years near the 
North River, not far from Hudson, in the state of New York, informs 
ine that he has particularly observed this bird to arrive there at the 
commencement of cold weather. He has often remarked its solitary 
habits. It seemed to seek the most unfrequented, shaded retreats, 
keeping almost constantly on the ground, yet would sometimes, tow- 
ards evening, mount to the top of a small tree, and repeat its notes 
which a little resemble those of the Baltimore) for a quarter of an 
our together; and this it generally did immediately before snow or 
falling weather. 
SNOW BUNTING. —EMBERIZA NIVALIS. —Fic. 97. 
Linn. Syst. 308. — Arct. Zool. p. 355, No, 222.— Tawny Bunting, Br. Zool. No. 
121.—L’Ortolan de Neige, Buff iv. 329. Pl. enl. 497.— Peale’s Museum, 
No. 5900. 
p 
PLECTROPHANES NIV ALIS, —Mevyer.* 
Emberiza nivalis, Flem. Br. Anim. p.'19.— Snow Pug Mont. Orn. Dict. i. 
Bew. Br. Birds, i._p. 148.— Selb. Ill. Orn. i. 247. pl. 52. — Tawny . Bunting, 
Mont. Orn. Dict. Bew. Br. Birds, i. 150.—Bruent de neize, Temm. Man. 
@’ Orn. i. p. 319. —Emberiza nivalis, Bonap. Synop. p. 103. — Emberiza (plec- 
trophanes) nivalis, North. Zool. ii. p. 246. 
Tus being one of those birds common to both continents, its mi- 
grations extending almost from the very pole to a distance of forty or 
fifty degrees around; and its manners and peculiarities having been 
* This species, from its various changes of plumage, has been multiplied into 
several ; and in form being allied to many genera, it has been variously placed b: 
different ornithologists. Meyer was the first to institute a place for itself, and, wi 
asecond, the Fringilla Lapponica, it will constitute his genus Plectrophanes, which 
is generally adopted into our modern systems. The discrepancies ,of form were 
also seen by Vieillot, who, without attending to his predecessor, made the genus 
Passerina of the Lapland Finch. They are both natives of America ; the latter 
has been added by the Prince of Musignano, and figured in Vol. III. It has 
