72 BIRDS OF ICELAND 



In a book entitled the Annals of Winchester College, 

 by T. F. Kirby, the following passage occurs: 'In 1553 

 the Society began to keep swans, and continued to do 

 so for many years, until in fact the turkey superseded 

 the swan at table. ... By 1556 the stock was increased 

 to " thirteen white olde swannes, and four of the 

 present yeare," and a few years later there were thirty- 

 three, "some white some ydyr," i.e. cygnets.' And a 

 footnote explains 'ydyr,' which has an unmistakably 

 Celtic appearance, to mean 'eider, or downy.' From 

 this it might be inferred that the Eider Duck gains its 

 name from a Welsh word meaning ' downy.' I believe 

 it is the other way on ; and, as Professor Skeat indicates, 

 ' eider ' is Old Norse {i.e. Icelandic) and not Celtic at all. 

 I may add that the Eider Duck is called '^5r' in the 

 Younger, or Prose, Edda, which was finally completed 

 not later than a.d. 1250, though much was written 

 considerably before that date. 



In the British Museum Catalogue, vol. xxvii., 

 p. 489, there is an ' Anas horcalis (Gm.) ' mentioned as 

 a ' doubtful species ' which has ' not yet been identified.' 

 Gmelin appears to have fixed upon a bird called by 

 Pennant {Arctic Zool., ii. p. 572) the ' Gulaund Duck,' 

 and given it this Latin name in Syst. Nat. Count 

 Salvadori conjectures that the bird indicated is the 

 Eider. This is clearly wrong ; the Gulond is a com- 

 mon everyday name in Iceland for the Goosander, 

 q.v. p. 75. 



