LAPLAND LONGSPUR. 
415 
and are of so social a disposition, that when separated from 
their own species, or when in small parties, they always join 
company with the common lark of Europe ; or in America, 
with some of the different snow birds. They feed chiefly on 
seeds, especially of the dwarf willows growing in frozen and 
mountainous countries, but occasionally also on leaves, grass, 
and insects. They breed on small hillocks, in open marshy 
fields; the nest is loosely constructed with moss and grasses, 
lined with a few feathers. The female lays five or six oblong 
eggs, yellowish rusty, somewhat clouded with brown. The 
Lapland longspur, like the larks, never sings but suspended 
aloft in the air, at which time it utters a few agreeable and 
melodious notes. 
As may be seen by the synonyms at the head of this article, 
this bird has been condemned by nomenclators to fluctuate 
between different genera. But between Fringilla and Emberiza 
it is not difficult to decide, as it possesses all the characters of 
the latter in an eminent degree, even more so than its near 
relative the snow bunting, which has never been misplaced. 
It has even the palatine knob of Emberiza^ and much more 
distinctly marked than in the snow bunting {Emberiza nivalis.) 
It has been erroneously placed in Fringilla^ merely on account 
of its bill being somewhat wider and more conic. 
Meyer has lately proposed, for the two just mentioned nearly 
allied species, a new genus under the name PlectropJianes^ (cor- 
responding to the English name we have used.) This we have 
adopted as a subgenus, and are almost inclined to admit as an 
independent genus, being well characterised both by form and 
habits. The two species of Plectrophanes, to which we apply 
the name of longspur, together with the buntings, are well 
distinguished from the finches by their upper mandible, con- 
tracted and narrower than the lower, their palatine tubercle, 
&c. From the typical Ewberizce they differ remarkably by the 
length and straightness of their hind nail, and the form of their 
wings, which, owing to the first and second primaries being 
longest, are acute. In the true buntings, the first quill is 
