359 



FAMILY XV.*— FRINGILLIN^. FINCHES. 

 Genus Il.f— EMBERIZA, Linn. BUNTING. 



BAIRD'S BUNTING. 



Emberiza Bairdii, Jlud. 

 PLATE D.— Adult Male. 



During one of our Buffalo hunts, on the 26th July, 1843, we happened to 

 pass along several wet places, closely overgrown by a kind of slender rush- 

 like grass, from which we heard the notes of this species, and which we 

 thought were produced by Marsh Wrens, ( Troglodytes palustris,) and my 

 friends Harris and John G. Bell immediately went in search of the birds. 

 Mr. Bell soon discovered that the notes of Baird's Bunting were softer and 

 more prolonged than those of the Marsh Wren. They had much difficulty 

 in raising them from the close and rather long grass, to which this species 

 appears to confine itself; several times Mr. Bell nearly trod on some of 

 them, before the birds would take to wing, and they almost instantaneously 

 re-alighted within a few steps, and then ran like mice through the grass. 

 After awhile, however, two were shot on the wing, and both fortunately 

 were found, and proved to be an adult male and female. We found this 

 species abundant in all such situations as I have mentioned above, and doubt- 

 less it breeds in them. 



I have named this species after my young friend Spencer F. Baird, of 

 Carlisle, Pennsylvania. 



Baird'3 Bunting, Emberiza Bairdii, Aud. 



Wet portions of the prairies of the Upper Missouri. 



Male. 



Bill stout and longish; wings rather long and broad, the second quill the 



* See vol. iii. p. 49. t Ibid. p. 58. 



