QUEEQUEDULA QUERQUEDDLA 233 



than many others of their kind, and they are not slow to profit by 

 what they can discern. 



Then, too, they keep much to fairly open water when resting, 

 and a sudden appearance of a detached clump of weeds floating 

 towards them at once puts them on the qui vivc, and long before the 

 clump gets within shooting distance, two out of three times they 

 leave for safer abodes. 



I once, however, came on a flock of these little birds which stuck 

 more persistently to their ground, or water, than any other flock of 

 ducks it has been my fortune to meet. This was in the district of 

 Hazaribagh, and I was going from Giridi to Hazaribagh in a push- 

 push, a sort of four-wheeled, inferior, springless brougham, when I 

 saw a flock of about forty teal on a tank close by the road. I got 

 out of the pusJi-pusJi, walked up to the tank, and got two Ijirds with 

 a right and left as they rose ; the birds wheeled round, and I got a 

 third : they went then to another tank 000 yards away, and, as I 

 followed them up, again rose and returned to the first piece of water, 

 leaving a fourth bird with me. I, too, went back and got yet 

 another brace, and after these yet another bird on the second piece 

 of water, and when I left with seven Garganey the rest were already 

 back on the tank by the road. This was, of course, in a badly-watered 

 part of the country, but on no other occasion, whether there was 

 water in abundance or not, have I ever known Garganey remain to 

 have more than a right and left fired at them. 



They are very silent birds as a rule. Hume speaks of them 

 chattering, like all other ducks in confinement, on the slightest 

 provocation, but their ordinary note, a loud strident quack, is very 

 seldom used when the birds are in a state of nature. Seebohm 

 considers their voice to be : — 



" Not quite so loud as a mallard, but is in a slightly higher key ; 

 it may be represented by the syllable knake. It is generally uttered 

 singly, but sometimes repeated twice. The quack is common to 

 both sexes, but in the breeding season the male utters a harsh grating 

 note, resembling kr-r-r." 



