542 Notes on the Habits of the Mallard, 



will indulge in long and lofty flights, and frequently take off 

 with the congregated wild-fowl in their nocturnal excursions, 

 [p. 45. and note *.] 



I have the finest possible opportunity of looking into the 

 habits of the mallard at any hour of the day, from the rising 

 to the setting sun ; for here this bird, and large flocks of its 

 congeners, are perpetual visitors during the winter months. 

 They fear no danger; and they seem to know that in this 

 populous neighbourhood there is one retreat left to which 

 they can retire, and in which they can find a shelter from the 

 persecutions which are poured down so thick upon them in 

 other places, by man, their ever watchful and insatiate pursuer. 



Some six years ago, I put a number of wild ducks' eggs to 

 be hatched by a domestic duck. The produce of these eggs 

 having intermixed with the common barn-door breed of ducks, 

 there has been produced by this union such an endless 

 variety of colouring, that it is now impossible to trace the 

 identical origin of the birds with any degree of certainty. 

 Half wild, half tame, they will come to the windows to be 

 fed ; but still they have a wariness about them quite remark- 

 able; and they will often startle and take wing at very trivial 

 causes of alarm. In this group the naturalist may see the 

 milk-white duck, and the duck in the real wild plumage; and 

 others of every other intermediate colour ; now sporting and 

 diving before him, now retiring to the stranger flocks at a 

 distance, and now rising with them in the air at the close of 

 day, to pursue in congregated numbers their journey through 

 the heavens, to those favourite places which afford them a 

 regular supply of food. 



In 1827, two males and three females made their appear- 

 ance here, and took up their permanent quarters with the 

 domestic ducks. They resembled the* original wild breed in 

 every thing except in size. You could barely perceive that 

 they were a trifle larger, and that was all. Hence I con- 

 clude that there must have been a shade of the reclaimed 

 duck in their parentage. Though shy at first, in time they 

 became surprisingly tame. One of the ducks singled out the 

 cook as an object worthy of its attention, and would steal into 

 the kitchen whenever an opportunity offered. The number 

 is now reduced to one, the other four having disappeared at 

 intervals. Fearing that this last remaining bird might give 

 me "the slip for ever," I have taken the precaution to pinion 

 him. The curtailing of his flight will probably be the means 

 of prolonging his existence ; for I always conjectured that his 

 companions had been surprised and killed in their aberra- 

 tions down the neighbouring brooks, where protection was 

 not extended to them. 



