514 ANATIDiE. 



they fly at a great height, in small loose flocks, without any 

 regard to order. Their notes consist of a kind of rough 

 grunt, variously modulated, hut hy no means musical, and 

 resembling the syllables croo, croo, crooli. The female 

 repeats it six or seven times in succession, when she sees 

 her young in danger. The same noise is made hy the male, 

 either when courting on the water, or as he passes on wing 

 near the hole where the female is laying one of her eggs."* 



In the adult male the bill is black ; the irides bright 

 yellow ; head and upper part of the neck black ; top of the 

 head ornamented with a semi-circular crest, the posterior 

 half of which is white edged with black ; back and wing- 

 coverts black; primaries, secondaries, rump, and tail- 

 feathers dark brown ; scapulars and inner secondaries 

 elongated, slender, and white, edged Avith black ; lower part 

 of neck in front white, with the points of two crescentic 

 bands descending from the upper part of the back, and 

 directed forwards ; belly, vent and under tail-coverts white ; 

 sides waved with yellowish -brown ; legs and feet dull red. 

 The whole length of the bird is nineteen inches ; the wing, 

 from the point to the end of the longest quill-feather, seven 

 inches and a half. 



The female is rather smaller in size ; the head, neck, back, 

 and wings dark brown ; top of the head reddish-brown, the 

 feathers elongated ; chin white ; neck in front pale brown, 

 the edges of the feathers lighter in colour ; under parts 

 white ; bill, irides, and feet, as in the males. The female 

 measures seventeen inches and a half in her whole length ; 

 the wing from the point seven inches. 



The young birds resemble the female for the first year ; 

 during the second the black and white about the head 

 appears in young males ; in the third spring they are com- 

 plete. 



In the downy nestling, the crown is huffish-brown ; upper 

 parts umber-brown with a few grey streaks ; sides of neck 



* As this long extract was given in former Editions, it is continued in the 

 present one ; with the exception of Audubon's description of the eggs, which is 

 obviously erroneous. — [Ed.] 



