246 WILD-FOWL AND SEA-FOWL OF GREAT BRITAIN 



those black-backed killers. Either they get knocked 

 off by the Gulls' wings, when sitting out on the 

 rock-ledges, and followed down by their oppressor 

 to where they may fall, or else they are killed and 

 eaten at their very nesting-places. Now the young 

 Cobs may chance to come to grief — but not, I think, 

 very often — from the interference of feathered 

 enemies. It seems a fortunate thins: for the divine: 

 ducks that such rapacious birds as the Gulls are 

 not able to dive. They can only float about, or, 

 as one might say, paddle on the water, light as corks. 

 Thirty-nine years ago, a female Eider was shot 

 on a Surrey moor, having been driven that way by 

 a fierce gale of wind ; and in 1893 I saw a Puffin 

 picked up alive in the same district. 



THE TUFTED DUCK. 

 {Fidigu/a CI isiata ) 



Male. — The bill light greyish-blue ; the nail 

 black ; iris bright yellow. Head and upper part of 

 neck black, with purple and green reflections. The 

 general colour of the upper parts is blackish-brown, 

 sprinkled with minute white dots. The breast and 

 sides are white ; a portion of the belly is greyish- 

 white, mottled with dusky, in waved lines. The hind- 

 part of the belly and the lower tail coverts are 

 brownish-black, and there is a white band on the 

 wing. Legs and feet are bluish-grey, and the webs 

 dusky. The length, from bill to tail, is seventeen 

 inches. 



