GARGANEY—GARROT 309 



GAEGANEY^ (North-Italian, Gargandlo), or Summer- Teal, 

 the Anas qnerqucdula and A. circia of Linnaeus (who made, as did 

 "Willughby and Ray, two species out of one), and the type of 

 Stephens's genus Querquedida. This is one of the smallest of the 

 Anatklse, and has gained its common English name from being 

 almost exclusively a summer-visitant to this countrj', where nowa- 

 days it only regularly resorts to breed in some parts of Norfolk, 

 though probably at one time found at the same season throughout 

 the great Fen-district. About the same size as the common Teal, 

 A. crecca, the male is readily distinguished therefrom by its 

 peculiarly- coloured head, the sides of which are nutmeg-brown, 

 closely freckled with short whitish streaks, while a conspicuous 

 white curved line descends backwards from the eyes. The upper 

 wing-coveils are bluish-grey, the scapulars black with a white shaft- 

 stripe, and the wing-spot {speculum) greyish-green bordered above 

 and below by white. The female closely resembles the hen Teal, 

 but possesses nearly the same wing-spot as her mate. In Ireland 

 or Scotland the Garganey is very rare, and though it is recorded 

 from Iceland, more satisfactory evidence of its occurrence there is 

 needed. It has not a high northern range, and its appearance in 

 Norway and Sweden is casual. Though it breeds in many parts of 

 Europe, in none can it be said to be common ; but it ranges far to 

 the eastward in x4.sia — even to Formosa, according to Swinhoe — 

 and yearly visits India in winter. Those that breed in Norfolk 

 arrive somewhat late in spring, and mostly make their nests in the 

 vast reed-beds which border the Broads — a situation rarely or never 

 chosen by the Teal. The labyrinth or bony enlargement of the 

 trachea in the male Garganey differs in form from that described 

 in any other drake,^ being more oval and placed nearly in the 

 median line of the windpipe, instead of on one side, as is usually 

 the case. 



GAEROT, a French name of the Golden-eye, which some 

 writers, beginning in 1829 with Griffith (Anim. Kingd. viii. p. 609) 



sur les quatre ceufs d'Alca impennis appartenant a notre coUectiou," 3Iim. Soc. 

 Zool. France, 1889, pp. 224-227, '' Addition a une Note," &c. Bull. Soc. Zool. 

 France, 1891, pp. 105-109. Lastly, reference cannot be omitted to the happy 

 exercise of poetic fancy with which Charles Kingsley was enabled to introduce 

 the chief facts of the Gare-fowl's extinction (derived from one of the above- 

 named papers) into his charming Water Babies. 



1 The word was introduced by Willughby from Gesner {Orn. lib. iii. p. 127), 

 but, though generally adopted by authors, seems never to have become other 

 than a book-name in English, the bird being invariably known in the parts ot 

 this island where it is indigenous as "Summer-Teal." 



- I have found no mention of this ijart in the Blue-winged Teal of North 

 America, A. discors, which in plumage has some resemblance to the Garganey ; 

 but did its labyrinth differ from the ordinary form, I think some one w'ould have 

 noticed the fact. 



