The Ducks. 



I SI 



summer and winter. 



The nest is made of 



grass, sea-weed, and 



water-plants, and is 



ined with down. The 



eggs are from five to eight in 



number, of a greenish stone- 



gre\' colour, and measure from 



three to three-and-a-quarter 



inches in length. 



The King 



THE 



KING EIDER. 



(Somatcria 



spectabilis.) 



The Common Ehiek-Duck. 



Eider is easily 

 di stinguished 

 from the Com- 

 mon Eider by 

 the shape of the feathering on 

 the forehead, which reaches 

 forward as far as the hinder end of the nostrils. This will serve to distinguish 

 the female birds, which otherwise resemble each other closely, except that the hen 

 of the King Eider is more rufous than that of the Common Eider. The male has 

 a V-shaped black mark on the throat, and has a cube of reddish orange on each 

 side of the base of the upper mandible. The head and nape are ot a delicate lavender 

 grey, with the hind neck and mantle pure white. It breeds in Arctic America, 

 Greenland and Northern I^uropc and Asia as far as Bering Sea, and occasionally 

 visits Great Britain in winter, a few individuals having been observed at intervals 

 ofl" our coasts. Like the Common luder, it is entirely a maritime Duck. The 

 nest is a depression in the ground, lined with the bird's own down, and the eggs are 

 of a greenish-stone colour or clay-brown, measuring two-and-a-half to two-and- 

 three-quarter inches in length. 



