KING EIDER. 465 



the Yoe ou the 20tli of April, 1846. Mr. C. Dixon states 

 that he ohserved two pairs in June 1884, off St. Kilda, and 

 he had " not the slightest douht that they were nesting on 

 the i3recipitous island of Doon " ; however, the fact of the 

 males and females being seen swimming side by side, as he 

 also states, seems rather to militate against this assumption, 

 for the males generally separate from the females as soon as 

 the latter begin to lay. 



In Ireland, according to Thompson, a King Eider was shot 

 in Kingstown Harbour in October 1837 ; in co. Kerry, one at 

 Derrynane, in the winter of 1843, and one at Tralee Bay in 

 that of 1845-46 ; and a female in Belfast Bay on the 11th 

 March, 1850. 



There is an authentic specimen of the King Eider in the 

 Museum at Boulogne : apparently the most southern locality 

 on record ; and even on the coasts of Holland, Denmark, 

 and the Baltic this species is of very rare occurrence. It 

 has not been known to breed in the Fseroes, to which it is 

 only an irregular visitant ; nor has it been found nesting 

 on the coast of Norway, although flocks occur in the 

 northern districts every winter. In Iceland it is rare, and 

 its reputed nesting rests on Faber's statement that a pair 

 did so on Videy in 1819 and 1820. It is doubtful if it breeds 

 on Spitsbergen, where it has been observed ; it nests, how- 

 ever, on Novaya Zemlya ; on the Kanin Peninsula ; on the 

 Yalmal Peninsula, between the Kara Sea and the Ob ; and 

 along the Arctic shores of Siberia. Von Middendorff observed 

 it on passage on the Boganida, finding its nest on the Taimyr 

 in about 74° N. lat. ; and the ' Vega ' expedition obtained 

 it at Pitlekaj. 



In America, the summer quarters of the King Eider 

 extend throughout the Arctic regions from the Pacific to the 

 Atlantic ; its northward range reaching nearly as far as man 

 has penetrated, for several nests were found by Major Feilden 

 when in H.M.S. 'Alert,' in 82° 27' N. ; while southwards it 

 has been found breeding in the Province of Quebec, in about 

 50^ N. In Greenland it breeds in Disco Fjord, near Godhavn, 

 and at I'pornnvik, altliongh l)y no means so jibnndiiut fliore 



VOL. IV. :> <» 



