202 
Mr. F. N. Chasen on the 
[Ibis, 
Galerida cristata. Crested Lark. 
The commonest Lark of the districts I visited and a 
resident bird. No pronounced migration was noticed, but a 
good deal of local movement took place. In one case this local 
movement was very decided—namely, the withdrawal of the 
birds from their winter quarters (e, g., the interior of 
the villages) in the early spring to the vicinity of their 
breeding-grounds. In the winter small parties of from six 
to twelve birds were met with in a variety of places. Unlike 
many other species of birds they showed no extreme gre¬ 
garious habits in severe weather, and rarely more than a 
dozen were seen together. Immediately the weather im¬ 
proved the small flocks broke up, and signs of pairing were 
evident at an early date. Indeed, a fair percentage of birds 
had remained in pairs all the winter. As early as 13 Feb¬ 
ruary, one of these Larks was making a laudable attempt to 
sing. It was a sunny day and the blue sky was quite spring¬ 
like, but there was a bitter wind blowing that ruffled the 
songster’s plumage to confusion as it sat on an old mud wall. 
In the villages they are fond of running about the rough 
roads and rolling about in “ sand-baths,” their vigorous 
actions in these raising little clouds of dust. 
Some bred on the level ground near the river. During 
the breeding-season they were very lame, running about in 
the long grass about twelve feet away and only reluctantly 
taking wing. Far more, however, nest on the hills, and in 
favoured places a good many nesls may be found in a small 
area. There were plenty of nests between Mirova and 
Kurkut in June, but the most prolific district seems to have 
been the country included by a radius of, say, four kilo¬ 
metres from Karamatli. I saw eggs during the third and 
fourth week in June and first week in July, but lack of 
observation is responsible for absence of earlier dates. Most 
of these were placed in the middle of a tussock of grass and 
stumbled upon when hunting for the eggs of Black-headed 
Buntings. Five nests found in one dav each contained 
three eggs, but these may have been incomplete clutches. 
