Birds. 3041 



Notes on Observations in Natural History during a Tour in Norway. 

 By the Rev. Alfred Charles Smith, M.A. 



[(Continued from page 3027). 



The Snow Bunting [Emberiza nivalis). I met with the snow bunt- 

 ing on the very highest and most barren fjeld : I was shooting 

 ptarmigan, and had slept at a sseter, or mountain farm, the preceding 

 night and with my companion, a Norwegian officer, who was a famous 

 mountaineer and an excellent naturalist, walked over the highest fjeld 

 I ever crossed, from 4 a.m. to 8 p.m. : this fjeld was by far the most 

 wild and barren I had ever seen ; it was near the Horungtinderne 

 range of mouu tains. Some idea of its loneliness and sterility may be 

 formed from the fact, that during those sixteen hours which we spent 

 in traversing it, we not only saw neither hut nor human being, but no 

 tree, or shrub, or heath, or earth : nothing but hard, bare, barren, 

 lichen-covered rocks, or enormous patches and fields of snow : here 

 and there a little rein-deer moss filled the crevices of the rocks, and 

 this was all the verdure of this wilderness of rocks and snow. Some- 

 times we had to plunge through the soft snow above our knees for 

 many a weary mile ; this was very fatiguing : at other times through 

 bogs of moss and melted snow ; and then, perhaps, through a wide 

 torrent, whose waters reached to our middle. Now we had to cross a 

 ridge of sharp rock, which stood like an island out of the snow ; the 

 sharp edges of the granite cutting into the leather of our shoes, now 

 completely soft and sodden with the melted snow. Now we had to 

 descend a steep snow-mountain : this was very difficult, and not with- 

 out considerable danger to those unaccustomed to them. As your 

 readers may not know what the descent of a Norwegian snow-mountain 

 is, I will explain it. Let them imagine a very steep mountain, co- 

 vered with deep never-melting snow, perhaps five or six hundred feet 

 in height, the side presenting a bank of snow as steep as the roof of 

 a house : to try whether the descent was practicable, we always placed 

 a large stone on the top, gave it a gentle push, and watched its pro- 

 gress. If the snow was soft enough to impede its pace, and allow it 

 to form a furrow for itself and glide gradually down, the descent was 

 pronounced feasible : if, on the contrary, the snow was not soft enough 

 for this, but the stone descended in successive bounds, it was pro- 

 nounced too dangerous to attempt. It was quite wonderful to see 

 the rapidity and ease with which our guide shot down these snow- 

 IX. K 



