GOLDEN-EYE. 437 



of mountains wliich separates Norway from Sweden, as well 

 as the eastern parts. It breeds in small numbers on the 

 coast of Norway, but not from Stavanger northward, and on 

 the Dovre Fjeld Mountains.* It prefers rivers to lakes, 

 particularly the neighbourhood of falls and rapids. The 

 Laps and settlers place boxes, with an entrance-hole, in the 

 trees on the banks of the rivers and lakes in which the 

 Golden-eye lays its eggs. Although the birds are always 

 robbed of their eggs, they gain nothing by experience, but 

 seem to have such a predilection for holes in trees that if 

 such cavities are to be found, artificial or natural, they 

 always appear to prefer them to any other locality. The 

 Golden-eye seems never to be driven from the north except 

 by the waters freezing up. During the long and dreadful 

 winter of 1837, the Golden-eyes did not altogether migrate ; 

 in the streams at Trolhattan, under the falls, and at various 

 rapids and open parts of the rivers, they were, in consider- 

 able numbers, all the winter, in company with the Goosander, 

 while all the Ducks, Mallards, and Wigeons were starved 

 to death and found dead upon the ice. There have been 

 speculations and opinions as to the mode the Golden-eye 

 adopts to carry its young down from the holes of the trees 

 in which they are hatched, which are frequently twelve or 

 fifteen feet from the ground, and at some distance from the 

 water. That the bird does transport them is beyond doubt. 

 There is, I believe, but one person who has ever actually 

 witnessed the manner : Nilsson was not aware of it. The 

 Laps, whom I frequently interrogated, were also ignorant, 

 beyond the mere fact of the bird carrying them. The 

 clergyman, however, at Quickiock, in Lulean Lapmark, near 

 the source of that chain of vast lakes whence the Lulean 

 river flows, was once a witness. Contrary to the general 

 character of the Lap clergymen in Lapland, this gentleman, 

 with little to employ him, took a great interest in natural 

 history and botany. While botanizing by the side of the 



* [Its breeding-range is now known to be more extensive ; Mr. A. C. Chapman 

 found its nest near Piilmak in Finland, nearly at the 70th parallel, where the 

 trees were hardly large enough to provide a hole for its occupation. — Ep.] 



