222 
EMBERIZA NIVALIS. 
bergen, where vegetation is nearly extinct, and scarcely 
any but cryptogamious plants are found. It therefore 
excites wonder, how birds, which are graminivorous in 
every other than those frost-bound regions, subsist: 
yet are there found in great flocks both on the land 
and ice of Spitzbergen.* They annually pass to this 
country by way of Norway ; for, in the spring, flocks 
innumerable appear, especially on the Norwegian isles, 
continue only three weeks, and then at once disappear.')' 
As they do not breed in Hudson’s Bay, it is certain 
that many retreat to this last of lands, and totally un- 
inhabited, to perform, in full security, the duties of 
love, incubation, and nutrition. That they breed in 1 
Spitzbergen, is very probable ; but we are assured that 
they do so in Greenland. They arrive there in April, 
and make their nests in the fissures of the rocks, on the 
mountains, in May ; the outside of their nest is grass, 
the middle of feathers, and the lining the down of the 
Arctic fox. They lay five eggs, white, spotted with 
brown : they sing finely near their nest. 
“ They are caught by the boys in autumn when they 
collect near the shores in great flocks, in order to 
migrate ; and are eaten dried. J 
“ In Europe, they inhabit, during summer, the most 
naked Lapland Alps, and descend in rigorous seasons 
into Sweden, and fill the roads and fields ; on which 
account the Dalecarlians call them illwarsfogel , or bad- 
weather birds — the Uplanders, hardwarsfogel, expres- 
sive of the same. The Laplanders style them alaipg. 
Leems$ remarks, I know not with what foundation, 
that they fatten on the flowing of the tides in Finmark, 
and grow lean on the ebb. The Laplanders take them 
in great numbers in hairsprings, for the tables, their 
flesh being very delicate. 
“ They seem to make the countries within the whole 
Arctic circle their summer residence, from whence they 
■■ 
* Lord Mulgrave’s Voyage , 188 ; Martin’s Voyage , 73. 
f Leems, 256. 
1 Faun. Greenland , 118. § Finmark , 255. 
