Alauda cristata, LINNÆUS; Le Cochevis, ou la grosse Alouette huppée; Die Haubenlerche, BECHSTEIN.
This bird is stronger than the sky-lark, and its colour is lighter, but its length the same. The beak is lead-coloured, and brown at the point, is also rather longer; the iris is dark brown. The shanks are an inch high, and yellowish gray; the head, the cheeks, the upper part of the neck to the upper part of the back, are of a reddish gray, caused by the wide red edges of the feathers, which are brown in the middle; a reddish white line, hardly perceptible above the eyes, but very distinct beyond, extends from the nostrils to the ears; eight or ten long-pointed blackish feathers rising on the head form a beautiful perpendicular crest.
The crest of the female is lower, but her breast is covered with more numerous and rounder spots than the male.
HABITATION.--When wild it is only in autumn and winter that they appear in Saxony in small or large flights, beside the high roads, on dunghills, near barns and stables, among sparrows and yellowhammers; they are also found all over Europe, from Sweden to Italy[62]; in summer, they frequent the thickets and bushes of the plains, fields, and meadows, or they inhabit the hollows of ditches, paths in woods, and elevated villages. They depart in October.
In the house they may be kept in cages, like the sky-lark, or be left to run about. I know no bird whose feathers grow so quickly; if the wings are kept clipped, this must be repeated every three or four weeks, as by that time they are so much grown that they may serve for flying about the room.
FOOD.--When wild this bird lives, like the sky-lark, on insects, different sorts of seeds, and oats. In the house it is fed with the same things, but it becomes more robust and healthy than the sky-lark.
BREEDING.--This species forms its nest on the ground, under little dry bushes, under garden vegetables, on clay walls, and even on thatched roofs. The eggs, in number from four to five, are of a rusty gray, shaded and spotted at the upper end with dark brown. The first plumage of the young before moulting is variegated white. They are taken from the nest when the feathers are half grown to be tamed and taught airs, or to have them instructed by other birds whose song is admired; they learn every thing with the greatest ease.