SONG BIRDS OF GREAT BRITAIN. 



wilds, and the immediate vicinity of houses, woods^ 

 and coppices. The small annual weeds that ripen 

 their seeds upon stubhle after the crops are re- 

 moved, are its favourite food. In winter it shifts 

 its quarters. From September to February, the 

 time that Larks are mute, they collect in very large 

 flocks, and the bird-catchers destroy them in great 

 numbers for the tables of the luxurious. Abundant 

 as they are, however, in Hertford and Northampton, 

 and some of the open cultivated counties of England, 

 they are not near so numerous as on some parts 

 of the Continent. The plains of Germany swarm 

 with them ; and they are so highly prized as an 

 article of food, that the tax upon them in the city of 

 Leipzig produces nearly a thousand pounds yearly 

 to the revenue.* 



The Lark builds its nest upon the ground with- 

 out any concealment. The nest, though simple, 

 is constructed with a good deal of care. The out- 

 side is composed of small twigs, bits of creeping- 

 roots, and coarse grass ; and the interior, of softer 

 grasses, sometimes, but not very often, mixed with 

 long hairs. 



The daisied lea he loves, where tufts of grass 

 Luxuriant crown the ridge : there with his mate 

 He founds their lowly house of wither'd herbs, 

 And coarsest spear-grass ; next, the inner work 

 With finer and still finer fibres lays. 

 Rounding it curious with his speckled breast.f 



It generally has two broods in the year. The 

 eggs are seldom more in one brood than four 



* British Naturalist. f Grahamc's Birds of Scotland. 



