1917-] Letters, Extracts, and Notes. 275 



Mr. Brooks liad either exceptionally bad luck or was uot 

 able to identify those birds when seen on the wing. 



I repeat that I have seen several pairs of T. patachonicus 

 fly high overhead from the inland lakes of Tierra del Fuego 

 to the sea and vice versa, and the birds after alighting on 

 the water have come up close to me. 



Mr. Phillips doubts the possibility of these birds being 

 able to fly to inland Chilian lakes as has been recorded 

 elsewhere. I can assure him that their flight is quite 

 strong enough to make such a thing possible, although on 

 a visit to one of those lakes (Lake Todos los Santos) I did 

 uot myself see any. 



Many species of waterfowl are sluggish in rising from 

 the water if forced to do so, but this does not prove their 

 inability to fly. In Chilian mountain streams on the Argen- 

 tine side of the Andes I could never persuade Merganetta 

 armata to rise from the water, but I have seen them fly at 

 some height of their own free will. 



T. cinereus as seen by me in Smith Channel and north- 

 wards along the south coast of Chiloe goes mostly in pairs, 

 both sexes being grey and the bills of both sexes being yellow. 

 The living bird which I brought home was an adult female, 

 and after its death this was verified at the Leyden Museum 

 by competent persons. It is no use Mr. Phillips saying that 

 such a bird does not exist because he has not seen one. 



Tachyeres cinereus has quite a different look, and as soon 

 as I entered Smith Channel and saw pairs swimming, they 

 struck me as being quite distinct from the birds I had seen 

 in Tierra del Fuego, both in appearance and in their way of 

 moving. 



I will here give an extract of a letter which was written 

 to me on this subject by an Englishman^ Mr. Stewart 

 Shipton, of Concepcion, prov. Tucuman, who resides in the 

 Argentine Republic, and whose collector had recently re- 

 turned from a trip to the southern parts of South America. 

 He writes, quoting his collector Mr. John Morgenseu, a 

 Dane : — " Tachyeres patacJionicus stands out first, chiefly on 

 account of its ability to fly ; but it is also distinguij;hed 

 from T. cinereus at a distance because it is smaller and the 



