VELVET-SCOTER. 73 



forward curve. Under water the leg- strokes are lateral like 

 those of a grebe. 



Usually in wet surroundings, the nest is a slight grass-lined 

 hollow, well concealed ; the five to eight creamy-white eggs 

 are laid in June, and surrounded with very dark down. They 

 measure about 2"5 by r8 inches. The duckling is dark brown 

 above and on the breast, and white beneath. 



The drake is glossy black above, very dark brown beneath, 

 and his bill is lead-blue, with an orange line on the prominent 

 basal knob and a wider mark below ; the legs are brownish 

 black, the irides dark brown. The brown dress of the duck is 

 relieved by the pale cheeks and whitish chin, and the young 

 have the under parts white mottled with brown. A young male 

 I examined in the flesh in March showed a small patch and 

 line of lemon-yellow on his but slightly swollen black bill ; his 

 legs were olive-brown, with darker webs. A younger bird, in 

 November, had the bill black and the legs dull yellow, the 

 dusky webs very noticeable between the yellow toes. Sir R. 

 Payne-Gallwey noticed that birds in their first winter often 

 show white feathers on neck and breast ; the young male above 

 had white patches, small and irregular, on its face and odd 

 white feathers on the nape. Length, 19 ins. Wing, 9 ins. 

 Tarsus, 175 ins. 



Yelvet-Scoter. CEdemia fusca (Linn.). 



The Velvet-Scoter (Plate 27) breeds in northern Europe 

 and north-western Asia, and in winter visits the Atlantic and 

 Mediterranean. To our shores it is a winter visitor in small 

 numbers, but is sometimes rather numerous off the east coast. 



The broad white wing bar of the glossy black Velvet-Scoter 

 shows well on the flying bird, or when, raising itself in the 

 water, it flaps its wings, but, as in other wildfowl, it is commonly 

 concealed by the secondaries or fluffed-out flank feathers when 



