22 
SNOW BUNTING. 
the rest of the Buntings. They may be kept, and have even 
been known to breed, in confinement. 
Their flight is described as low, performed in an undulated 
line, by means of repeated flappings, and short intervals of 
cessation; when they have arrived at a fitting place, they 
wheel suddenly round, and alight rather abruptly, when 
the white of the wings and tail becomes very conspicuous. 
They run with great celerity along the sand, moving each 
foot alternately, and when engaged in this manner, doubtless 
in search of food, or of small sand and gravel, may be easily 
approached within a few yards. They usually perch on a 
crag or rock, the top of a wall, a rail, or a stack, and some¬ 
times it is said, on trees: they roost on the ground. 
Their food consists principally of the different sorts of grain, 
and the seeds of grasses and other plants, as also of small 
mollusca, the caterpillars and chrysalides of insects, and insects 
themselves. 
The note is low and soft, and it is uttered on the wing 
when the male bird serenades his mate, rising a little way 
into the air, and hovering about with expanded wings and 
tail. 
The nest, which is made of dry grass, lined with hair and 
a few feathers, is generally fixed in the crevice of a rock, or 
among stones on the ground. Captain Lyons, R.N., found 
one placed in the bosom of a dead Esquimaux child, a situation 
suggestive of affecting thoughts, but the history connected 
with which must remain unknown until that day when both 
land and sea shall give up their dead. Others have been 
found under the shelter of the drift timber, which is, alas! 
but too frequently to be met with on the shores of the frozen 
seas. How many a tale also does it tell with its expressive 
though silent voice, 
‘Of those 
For whom the place was kept, 
At hoard and hearth so long.’ 
Fervently do 1 trust that the ‘brave old oak’ of the gallant 
Sir John Franklin’s trusty ships, may yet be found to have 
afforded no shelter for the nest of the Snow-flake, but that 
in the words of the still-used form of the old bills of lading, 
‘so may the good ship arrive at her desired port in safety/ 
The eggs, from four to six in number, are greenish or 
bluish white, encircled at the thicker end with irregular brown 
spots, and many blots of pale purple: they are rather round 
