58 INDIAN SPOETING BIKDS 



either in trees, on cane-brakes, or among rushes — about anywhere 

 where any duck ever does nest, in fact, except underground, 

 though nests made by the birds themselves on the boughs, 

 a rare habit among ducks, are the most usual. The eggs 

 are rather rounded, very smooth, and creamy-white when 

 fresh ; while the female is sitting the drake keeps guard close 

 by, and the young are carried down to the water in the old 

 birds' feet. The bird, which extends outside our limits to 

 Java, has many native names : Saral, Sharul, Harrali-hans, in 

 Bengali ; Hansrali in Uriya ; Horali in Assam ; and Tatta 

 Saaru in Ceylon ; Tingi in Manipur ; the Telugu name is 

 Yerra Chilluwa. 



Large Whistler. 



Dendrocycna majoi\ Burra Silli, Hindustani. 



The large whistler presents the peculiarities of its small 

 common cousin in an exaggerated form ; it is longer-necked and 

 more leggy, and has bigger feet and head ; its wings are blacker, 

 and its body-colour a much richer brown — chestnut instead of 

 dun, in fact ; its feet are often much lighter, French-grey instead 

 of dark slate ; and it is far bigger, weighing up to two pounds, 

 though it takes a good male to reach this. Nearly all these 

 distinctions, however, though the most striking, are comparative ; 

 more positive ones are the presence of a transverse curved patch 

 of cream colour above the large whistler's tail, most noticeable 

 when it takes wing ; this is replaced by dark inconspicuous 

 maroon in the small whistler, which, on the other hand, has 

 a conspicuous yellow ring round the eye, owing to the edge 

 of the eyelids being thus coloured ; in the large bird they are 

 grey, like the bill and feet. On the water the much more 

 strongly developed streaking of cream colour on the flanks, as 

 well as the redder head and breast and darker back, make the 

 big whistler noticeable. 



It swims as well and dives as freely as the small kind, but 

 also comes ashore a great deal more, and does not divide its 

 time so rigidly between the water and the trees. On the wing 

 it is far swifter, and being more wary, is a really sporting bird ; 



