BIEDS OF NOETHEKN CANADA 403 



composed of wiry grass steins, with a few feathers in the 

 lining. External diameter 3.75 inches, internal about 3, 

 depth 2.50 externally and 1.50 inches internally. The 

 eggs, five in number, are of a dull white, with perhaps a 

 faint bluish cast, sprinkled and spattered with a dilute yellow- 

 ish-rufous, the markings most numerous towards the larger 

 end. They measure 0.95 of an inch in length by 0.64 in 

 breadth." The parent bird was snared on the nest. In 

 1865 we met with a number of the snowflake on the same 

 sea coast, but failed to find another nest. Mr. W. Raine 

 states that on June 25th, 1901, a snow bunting built its nest 

 in a hole under the eave of Mr. (Bishop) Stringer's house 

 on Herschell Island, in the Arctic Ocean, west of the Mac- 

 kenzie Bay. He found another nest and eggs on the ground 

 in a hollow at the side of a hummock on June 18th. When 

 migrating to and from the far north, it is common enough at 

 times on the Mackenzie, the Athabasca, in Cumberland, as 

 well as in portions of British Columbia. 



There are sixteen specimens, but not a single snowflake 

 egg, in the Ottawa Museum! 



536. Lapland Longspue — Calcarius lapponicus (Linn.). 



Mr. Eaiue has a dozen nests with sets of eggs that were 

 collected at Herschell Island by Mr. (now Bishop) Stringer- 

 and Mr. Young. The nests are made of dried grass well 

 lined with feathers, and are always built on the ground, in. 

 the shelter of a tuft of grass or sod, and contains five or six 

 eggs. The eggs are laid in the middle of June, and the female- 

 is a close sitter, most of the nests being found by flushing the 

 bird off the nest." Altogether eighty-three nests of this; 

 species were obtained by us in the Barren Grounds, as wellf 

 as on the shores of Franklin Bay. One from the latter,, 

 found on the 27th June, 1864, was, like all of the others, built 

 on the ground, and is deeply saucer-shaped, measuring 3.75 

 inches external and 2.30 inches internal diameter ; the depth 

 2.75 inches exteriorly and 1.50 interiorly. It is composed 



