336 SWIMMERS. 



strikingly beautiful appearance, and the bird is familiar only in the 

 duller colors, worn at all seasons by the young male and female ; 

 and in this inconspicuous dress these birds are enabled to avoid 

 observation by hiding in the rank herbage so common at their 

 resorts, and thus have gained a reputation for being rare, while 

 they are fairly common. They are known to be common by the 

 gunners of Chesapeake Bay, who take them to market, — their 

 food being chiefly marine plants, which they obtain by diving; 

 their flesh is tender, and of pleasant flavor. 



CANVAS-BACK 



Aythya vallisneria. 



Char. Mantle and sides silvery white, daintily marked with waved 

 lines of dusky ; head and neck brownish red ; lower neck and breast and 

 rump brownish black ; wings and tail gray ; under parts white ; bill black ; 

 legs leaden gray. In the female the head, neck, and breast are dull 

 brown ; upper parts grayish brown ; belly white. Length about 22 inches. 



Nest. In marshy margin of stream or lake, concealed amid rank her- 

 bage, — made usually of grass and weed stems and lined with feathers. 



Eggs. 6-10 ; grayish olive, — sometimes tinged with drab; 2.40 X 1.75. 



The Canvas-back, so well known as a delicacy of the table, 

 is a species peculiar to the continent of America. It breeds, 

 according to Richardson, in all parts of the remote fur coun- 

 tries, from the 50th parallel to their most northern limits, and 

 at this period associates much on the water with the ordinary 

 tribe of Ducks. After the close of the period of reproduction, 

 accumulating in flocks, and driven to the open waters of the 

 South for their favorite means of subsistence, these birds arrive 

 about the middle of October seawards on the coast of the 

 United States. A few at this time visit the Hudson and the 

 Delaware, but the great body of emigrants take up their quar- 

 ters in the Bay of Chesapeake and in the numerous estuaries 

 and principal rivers which empty into it, particularly the Sus- 

 quehanna, the Patapsco, Potomac, and James rivers. They 

 also frequent the sounds and bays of North Carolina, and are 

 abundant in the river Neuse, in the vicinity of Newbem, and 

 probably in most of the other Southern waters to the coast of 



