82 THE BIPDS OF THE BRITISH ISLES. 



The head and neck of the drake are black glossed with 

 green and purple, and with the fan-shaped white patch from 

 the eye to the nape. The head is a little like that of the Bufifel- , 

 headed Duck, but the white patch in this bird is not edged 

 with black, nor has it the breast marks or merganser bill. 

 Otherwise the Hooded Merganser is mainly black and white, 

 with grey vermiculations on the brown flanks. The female is 

 brown above and on the breast, and the crest — without any 

 white — is smaller and more of the merganser shape. The 

 under parts are white. The bill is black, the legs dark red, 

 the irides yellow. Length, 19 ins. Wmg, 775 ins. Tarsus, 

 rS ins. 



Smew. Mergelliis albellns (Linn.). 



The Smew (Plate 28), the smallest of the mergansers, is a 

 native of north Europe and Asia, and in winter visits the 

 Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts as well as the larger 

 European lakes. Although more abundant as a winter visitor 

 to our east coast, it occurs from time to time in all parts of 

 Britain, visiting bays, estuaries, and inland waters. Immature 

 brown-headed birds are commoner than old drakes. 



The adult drake, about an inch and a half longer than the 

 duck, is without being really white one of the wiiitest looking 

 of our birds, for the velvet-black markings enchance the snowy 

 appearance. The "White Nun," as it is called to distinguish 

 it from the female and immature " Red-headed Smews," has a 

 drooping white crest with two converging green-black lines; 

 round the eye, from the short and slightly uptilted blue-grey 

 bill, is a circular patch of black, and as the bird swims with all 

 its feathers in place and with the finely grey lined flanks 

 concealing most of the black on the wings, the general effect is 

 of a white bird with fine and regular black lines. The back 

 shows as a black line above the scapulars, another narrow line 

 marks the edge of the wing, and two inward curving lines cross 



