A History of North American Birds, Land Birds. Volume 2. Robert Ridgway

abundant distribution through two widely distant and essentially different regions.

      During a large portion of the year, or from October to April, these birds may be found in all parts of the United States. Dr. Woodhouse found them very common throughout Texas, the Indian Territory, New Mexico, and California. Mr. Dresser states that he found the western variety—which he thinks essentially different in several respects from the eastern—in great numbers, from October to the end of March, in the prairies around San Antonio. Afterwards, at Galveston, in May and June, 1864, he noticed and shot several specimens. Although he did not succeed in finding any nests, he was very sure that they were breeding there. It is common, during winter, on the Atlantic coast, from Massachusetts to South Carolina. In Maine it is comparatively rare. In Arizona, Dr. Coues speaks of the western form as a permanent resident in all situations adapted to its wants. The same writer, who also had an opportunity of observing the eastern variety in Labrador, where he found it very abundant on all the moss-covered islands around the coast, could notice nothing in their voice, flight, or general manners, different from their usual habits in their southern migrations, except that during the breeding-season they do not associate in flocks.

      Richardson states that this Lark arrives in the fur countries in company with the Lapland Bunting, with which it associates, and, being a shyer bird, would act as sentinel and give the alarm on the approach of danger. As Mr. Dall only obtained a single skin on the Yukon, it probably is not common there. Dr. Suckley states it to be a very abundant summer resident on the gravelly prairies near Fort Steilacoom, in Washington Territory. He describes it as a tame, unsuspicious bird, allowing a man to approach within a few feet of it. It is essentially a ground bird, rarely alighting on bushes or shrubs.

      Dr. Cooper adds to this that the Shore Lark is common in the interior, but he only noticed one on the coast border. In ordinary seasons they seem to be permanent residents, and in winter to be both more gregarious and more common. He met with one as late as July 1, on a gravelly plain near Olympia, scratching out a hollow for its nest under a tussock of grass.

      Dr. Cooper also found these birds around Fort Mohave in considerable flocks about the end of February, but all had left the valley by the end of March. About May 29 he found numbers of them towards the summits of the Providence range of mountains, west of the valley, and not far from four thousand feet above it, where they probably had nests. They were also common in July on the cooler plains towards the ocean, so that they doubtless breed in many of the southern portions of California, as well as at Puget Sound and on the Great Plains. Dr. Cooper states that in May or June the males rise almost perpendicularly into the air, until almost out of sight, and fly around in an irregular circle, singing a sweet and varied song for several minutes, when they descend nearly to the spot from which they started. Their nests were usually found in a small depression of the ground, often under a tuft of grass or a bush. Mr. Nuttall started a Shore Lark from her nest, on the plains, near the banks of the Platte. It was in a small depression on the ground, and was made of bent grass, and lined with coarse bison-hair. The eggs were olive-white, minutely spotted all over with a darker tinge.

      According to Audubon, these Larks breed abundantly on the high and desolate granite tracts that abound along the coast of Labrador. These rocks are covered with large patches of mosses and lichens. In the midst of these this bird places her nest, disposed with so much care, and the moss so much resembling the bird in hue, that the nests are not readily noticed. When flushed from her nest, she flutters away, feigning lameness so cunningly as to deceive almost any one not on his guard. The male at once joins her, and both utter the most soft and plaintive notes of woe. The nest is embedded in the moss to its edges, and is composed of fine grasses, circularly disposed and forming a bed about two inches thick. It is lined with the feathers of the grouse and of other birds. The eggs, deposited early in July, are four or five in number, and are described by Mr. Audubon as marked with bluish as well as brown spots.

      About a week before they can fly, the young leave the nest, and follow their parents over these beds of mosses to be fed. They run nimbly, and squat closely at the first approach of danger. If observed and pursued, they open their wings and flutter off with great celerity.

      These birds reach Labrador early in June, when the male birds are very pugnacious, and engage frequently in very singular fights, in which often several others besides the first parties join, fluttering, biting, and tumbling over in the manner of the European House Sparrow. The male is described as singing sweetly while on the wing, but its song is comparatively short. It will also sing while on the ground, but less frequently, and with less fulness. Its call-note is quite mellow, and is at times so altered, in a ventriloquial manner, as to seem like that of another bird. As soon as the young are hatched their song ceases. It is said to feed on grass-seeds, the blossoms of small plants, and insects, often catching the latter on the wing, and following them to a considerable distance. It also gathers minute crustaceans on the sea-shore.

      Mr. Ridgway found this species abundant over the arid wastes of the interior, and, in many localities, it was almost the only bird to be found. In its habits he could observe no differences between this bird and the alpestris. He met with their nests and eggs in the Truckee Reservation, June 3. The nest was embedded in the hard, grassy ground, beneath a small scraggy sage-bush, on the mesa, between the river and the mountains.

      Mr. J. K. Lord mentions that, having encamped at Cedar Springs on the Great Plains of the Columbia, where the small stream was the only water within a long distance, he became interested in watching the movements of these Larks. As evening approached they came boldly in among the mules and men, intense thirst overcoming all sense of fear. He found these handsome little birds very plentiful throughout British Columbia. They were nesting very early on those sandy plains, even before the snow had left the ground. He saw young fledglings early in May.

      A single specimen of this species was taken at Godhaab, Greenland, in October, 1835.

      Eggs from Labrador are much larger in size than those from Wisconsin. Two eggs from the first, one obtained by Mr. Thienemann, the other by Mr. George Peck, of Burlington, Vt., measure .93 and .94 of an inch in length by .71 in breadth; while some from the West are only .83 in length and .63 in breadth, their greatest length being .90, and their largest breadth .69 of an inch. In their ground-color and markings, eggs from both localities vary about alike. The ground-color varies from a purplish-white to a dark gray, while the spots are in some a brownish-lavender, in others a brown, and, quite frequently, an olive-brown. In some they are in larger, scattered blotches; while in others they are in very fine minute dots so thickly and so uniformly diffused as almost to conceal the ground.