LARK. 267 



colours. In the Leverian Museum was one, mixed brown and white, 

 the belly pure white : another variegated with white all over, but 

 regularly dispersed throughout, imitating the beautiful pencilling of 

 the Wryneck : one, in my own collection, was wholly light cream- 

 colour. 



B.— Alauda nigra, Biis. iii. 340. B. Id. 8vo. i. - 405. hid. Orn. ii. 492. y. 



Alouette noir, Buf. v. 22. PL enl. 650. 1. 



Black Lark, Albin, iii. pi. 51. Gen. Syn. iv. 370. B. 



In this the bill and legs are dirty yellow; plumage in general 

 dull reddish brown, approaching to black, except the hind part of 

 the head, which is dull yellow, and some of the feathers fringed with 

 white: so far Albin, but we have seen more than one specimen in 

 which the whole plumage was full black.* 



A Variety is said to be found in Russia, differing from the common 

 one, in having longer legs, otherwise very like our Skylark ; it never 

 rises, but sings sitting on the ground, and found only on the Mongo- 

 lian Frontiers : f seen near the Caspian Sea, in January. J 



The Skylark, or one very little varying therefrom, is found in 

 India ; the quills and tail seem darker, the latter a little hollowed 

 out in the middle, scarcely to be called forked ; legs pale red brown ; 

 streak over the eye more conspicuous than in the European species. 

 I observed one of these in the collection of drawings of General 

 Hardwicke, by the name of Gulgul ; found at Cawnpore, in No- 

 vember; said to be a female, and weighed fifteen drachms. 



* The circumstance of this and other birds becoming black, by feeding on hemp seed, 

 is well known, and mentioned before, in respect to the House Sparrow and Goldfinch; but 

 Albin's bird was caught at large, in a net, among others, at Highgate, and must have hap- 

 pened from a cause less artificial. One, in the British Museum, is fully black throughout. 



■f Mr. Pennant, from the papers of Dr. Pallas. 



J Gmel. reise. iv. p. 141. 



Mm 2 



