SCAUP DUCK. 425 



Now the fact is, that the part on which this vegetable was 

 growing was decayed, and had no longer in itself a living 

 principle ; the dead part, therefore, became the proper 

 pabulum of th^ invisible seeds of the mucor, transmitted 

 by the air in respiration ; and thus nature carries on all 

 her works immutably under every possible variation of cir- 

 cumstance. It would, indeed, be impossible for such to 

 vegetate on a living body, being incompatible with vitality, 

 and we may be assured that decay must take place before 

 this minute vegetable can make a lodgment to aid in the 

 great change of decomposition. Even with inanimate bodies 

 the appearance of mould or any species of fnngi, is a sure 

 presage of partial decay and decomposition." 



M. De Selys Longchamps found a similar growth lining 

 the air-cells in the lungs of an Eider Duck ; * and Mr. 

 [now Sir Richard] Owen described the same appearance as 

 found by himself in the bronchial tubes of a Flamingo, f 

 References to descriptions and figures of various singular 

 vegetable growths on insects will be found in the first Part 

 of the third volume of the Transactions of the Entomo- 

 logical Society of London ; and those acquainted with 

 Edwards' Gleanings in Natural History, will remember his 

 coloured representations of grubs and wasps exhibiting 

 vegetation, in plates 335 and 336. 



In spring, the Scaup Ducks take their departure from our 

 shores ; and although it is possible that some pairs remain 

 to breed in Scotland, the evidence on this point is not yet 

 quite complete. Selby wrote in his notice of the birds 

 found when exploring Suthcrlandshire in the month of 

 June, 1834 : — " A single female was shot by Sir William 

 Jardine, in a small loch between Loch Hope and Eriboll ; 

 she was attended by a young one, which unfortunately 

 escaped among the reeds," but, in a subsequent communi- 

 cation to Mr. Harvie-Brown, the late Sir William Jardine 

 expressed some doubts as to the identification of the young 

 bird. In June 1868, Mr. Harvie-Brown shot an adult 

 male Scaup on a loch in the west of Sutherlandshiro, when 



* Ann. Nat. Hist. viii. p. '220. f Vr. Zool. Soc. 1832, p. 112. 



VOL. IV. 3 I 



