LARKS. 
421 
they spend in smaller or larger companies in milder climates. Many winter on the 
Main and Rhine, and in Franconia and Thuringia, arriving there in October and 
November, and disappearing at the first commencement of spring. Here in 
Northern Germany these larks are resident or partially migratory, these latter 
rambling in pairs or small companies from place to place, and arriving in winter 
where they are not observed in summer, but seldom remaining there long. The time 
of migration is in November and December. Old pairs remain year after year at 
the same breeding-place. They migrate from the one inhabited place to the other 
in the daytime, generally in the forenoon, and fly at a considerable altitude.” 
The song of the crested lark is sweeter and in some respects more pleasing than 
that of the skylark. This lark nests upon the ground in any small depression 
of the soil or behind a clod of earth; the nest being loosely and simply constructed 
of stems of dry grass and fine roots, sometimes lined with a little horsehair. 
The eggs are greyish white in ground-colour, marked with dark or light brown 
and grey. Fresh eggs may be found from the middle of April until the middle of 
July. The crested lark is a favourite cage-bird in Germany; and it may be seen 
from time to time exposed in the Paris bird-market. In India the crested lark 
is frequently caged, and kept in darkness by its cage being wrapped in a cloth. 
In this state it learns to sing very sweetly, and even to imitate the songs of other 
birds. The crested lark has the upper-parts brown; the feathers of the neck and 
back having dark centres fringed with buff; the crest is conspicuous, and consists 
of nine or ten narrow feathers, blackish brown in colour, edged with buff; the lower- 
parts are creamy white; while the sides of the throat are spotted with blackish 
brown; the feathers of the breast and flanks being streaked with dark brown. 
In the genus Alcemon the bill is very long and slender, gently 
curved on its terminal half, while the nostrils are fully exposed to 
view; the first of the ten primaries of the wing being small, but exceeding the 
primary coverts. The toes and claws are very short, and the latter are stout. 
The plumage is the same in both sexes. 
The desert-lark {A. desertorum ) inhabits the deserts of Arabia and 
Northern Africa, extending eastwards into Afghanistan and Western India. It is 
thinly distributed throughout the desolate wastes in which it finds its home, living 
in pairs, each of which enjoys the run of its own territory. This lark traverses the 
sandy plains with great celerity. The song of the male is often uttered in the 
breeding-season, but it is short and unpretentious. Breeding in May and June, 
when it makes a small nest of dried grass on the sand, the clesert-lark lays eggs, 
which are greyish white, marked with yellowish brown. The plumage of many 
birds has become modified in order to serve the purposes of concealment from their 
enemies; and the desert-lark, like other species that haunt sterile wildernesses, has 
gradually assumed a plumage of an isabelline grey, tinged with ash on the forehead 
and upper tail-coverts. The first primaries are black, with white bases; the tail- 
feathers black margined with fulvous, the two central feathers being sandy brown, 
broadly edged with very bright fulvous; a black streak passes through the lores 
with a white band above and beneath; a black band passes backward from the 
eye; the chin and throat are white, as is the abdomen; but the fore-neck and 
breast are pale fulvous, spotted with black. 
The Desert-Lark. 
