




























118 Messrs. H. Seebohm and J. A. Harvie Brown on 
the last-mentioned date until we found them scattered over 
their great breeding-haunts on the northern tundras. Nests 
and eggs were brought to us by the Zyriani on the 22nd 
June—the nests invariably lined with feathers, which serve 
to distinguish their contents from the eggs of Anthus cervi- 
nus, the nest of which latter bird is lined with wiry grass, and 
contains no feathers. By the 24th June the eggs were con- 
siderably incubated ; and on the 6th July we found young 
able to fly. The Lapland Bunting is essentially a bird of the 
tundra, and is widely and numerously distributed over the 
whole tundra-land as far as we went, viz. to Dvoinik, where 
we obtained young birds. On one occasion we saw the species 
on one of the willow-covered islands opposite Stanavoialachta, 
a solitary example which may or may not have been breed- 
ing there. 
PLECTROPHANES NIVALIS (L.). 
The Snow-Bunting is exceedingly abundant all the way 
north and east from Archangel to Ust Zylma during the 
spring; and great numbers of these lovely birds are caught by 
the village boys in horsehair nooses, and sold at the rate of 
100 for half a rouble; and very good eating they are. Large 
flocks were feeding on the great manure heaps by the side of 
the river Mezen, close to the town, in the beginning of 
April; and they were even more abundant at Ust Zylma, in 
the irregular streets and yards of the town, and on the hill- 
slopes behind, where the snow had disappeared during the 
partial thaws, and where manure had been sledged out and > 
spread by the natives. By the 24th May nearly every Snow- 
Bunting had disappeared from Ust Zylma. 
It was not until long afterwards that we saw a few at 
Dvoinik, where we secured the full-grown young on the 23rd 
July, and also the old birds in full breeding-dress. They 
were flying about and settling upon the great piles of drift- 
wood close to the beach, which appeared to be a suitable 
haunt ; but we cannot say whether they were reared there or 
on the Pytkoff Mountains, some 15 miles inland. 
During the migration we constantly saw Snow-Buntings 


