428 Messrs. C. G. Danford and J. A. Ilarvic Brown on 



found great difficulty in getting near tlicm, and for some days 

 only succeeded in shooting one male^ and tliat at very long 

 range. A couple of days before our departure, however, we 

 were more fortunate ; the birds were tamer, and let us get a 

 number of long shots, by which we killed three more males 

 and a female. They never attempted to leave the lake, but 

 after a short rapid flight pitched again, generally about the 

 same place. They swam very fast, keeping their stiff Wood- 

 pecker-like tails erect at right angles with the body, and when 

 wounded, though they dived constantly, showed no disposi- 

 tion to escape, like other Ducks, by hiding among the reeds, 

 but on the contrary avoided them. The bill of the male, when 

 newly killed, is of a beautiful pure ultramarine, this colour 

 extending even to the interior of the mouth. It soon fades, 

 being merely connected with a thin, easily moved membrane ; 

 and in twenty -four hours the bill loses its brilliant appearance, 

 turning to a brownish grey. We were too early for their 

 nesting, but were assured that they bred in this district, pro- 

 bably at the lake where we found them. In the Klausenburg 

 Museum are some young birds sent from Gyeke, and also 

 some adults got there by the curator of the Museum, Herr 

 Klir. Writing of this species as observed by him in the 

 Mezoseg (A Mezoseg II. A Mezo-Zah, &c.), Herr Otto 

 says, — "They came in April, went away for a short time, 

 and returned in May ; nested among the thick reeds in the 

 lake at Zah : in the first half of June had fine young (chicks), 

 three of which were taken. '^ He compares the look of the 

 bird, when swimming, to the double-peaked Hungarian saddle. 

 Graf Lazar also procured two unfledged birds in the Tartaria 

 marsh, and a young bird at Benczencz. 



Herr Hermann Otto describes the young as follows : — 

 " Beak bluish black, with a swelling at the base. Feet of 

 a similar colour. Plumage brown-black. From the base of 

 the bill, under the eye, and continued over the ear, a white 

 stripe. Chin, with a broad outward curve back under the 

 cheek, white, so that the brown cheek appears bordered un- 

 derneath by this curve, and above by the eye-stripe. Belly 

 dirty white, which colour loses itself in the sides. Under 



