450 WEB-FOOTED BIRDS. 



gions. When discovered, they display the utmost vigilance, 

 and instantly take to wing. It is considered to be a game 

 superior in flavor to the Common Wild Duck. From the 

 singular and beautiful crescent-shaped lines and marks 

 which ornament its neck and breast it has probably come 

 by the dignified appellation of lord, among the fishers of 

 Newfoundland. It is here too rare to have acquired any 

 particular name. 



The Harlequin Duck is about 20 inches in length; the wing 8 

 inches ; the bill above, 1 inch 1 line ; the tarsus 1^ inches. The gen- 

 eral color of the male is plumbeous inclining to blue. The head and 

 neck black with a gloss of violet. A large triangular space of white 

 betwixt the base of the bill and the front of the eye connecting with 

 a chestnut stripe descending to the occiput where it meets and in- 

 cludes a stripe of black. An oval white spot near the ears. A lin- 

 ear-oblong white patch of about 1| inches on the sides of the nape. 

 A white ring round the base of the neck, broader anteriorly ; also a 

 long curving white spot margined with black on either side from the 

 shoulders towards the front of the breast. Tertiaries and scapulars 

 with a broad white space on their inner webs towards their tips. 

 The speculum black glossed with indigo-blue. Beneath slate color 

 tinged with chestnut. Flanks as far as the thighs bright chestnut. 

 Rump and longish pointed tail, black. A small white spot on the 

 sides near the rump. Bill bluish-black, the tip orange-red. Irids 

 dusky. Legs and feet blackish-brown. Wings 1^ inches shorter 

 than the tapering tail. The female much smaller than the male. 



Subgenus. — *Macropus. 



The hill nearly as high as the head at the base, and narrowed 

 towards the extremity. JVostrils basal. The head small. The body 

 and feet robust. The tertiaries curving outwards, Tail wedge- 

 shaped, composed of 12 feathers. Nearly allied to the subgenus 

 OiDEMiA, but without the frontal plates at the base of the bill. 



This very singular Duck is confined to East Asia and the western 

 side of the American continent, where it dwells in high latitudes 

 and nests in the inaccessible cliffs contiguous to the sea coast. 



