246 INDIAN DUCKS 



again drops into the rushes within a couple of hundred yards. When 

 there has been a good deal of "shooting on a lake and almost all the 

 other duck, and with them, of course, some of these, are circling round 

 and round, high in the air, you still keep, as you push through the 

 reeds and rushes, continually flushing the Marbled Teal, and the broad 

 must be small, or the liunting very close and long continued, to induce 

 all the Marbled Teal to take wing. Of course, where there is a little 

 cover (though there you never meet with this duck in large numbers) 

 they rise and fly about with the other ducks, but their tendency in 

 these respects is rather coot-like than duck-like. Individuals may 

 take wing at the first near shot, but the great majority of them stick 

 to cover as long as this is possible ; and on two occasions I saw 

 very pretty shooting, boats in line pushing up a wide extent of rush- 

 grown water, and the Marbled Teal rising every minute in front 

 of us at distances of 60 or 70 yards, like Partridges out of some 

 of our great Norfolk turnip-fields ; here and there a Shoveller or a 

 White-eyed Pochard, both of which, when disturbed, cling a good deal 

 to cover, would be flushed, but there was not one of these to ten of the 

 Marbled Teal. The flight of this species, though Teal-like, is less 

 rapid and flexible (if I may coin an expression to represent the extreme 

 facility with which that species turns and twists in the air) than that 

 of the Common Teal. It more nearly resemljles that of the Garganey, 

 but is less powerful and less rapid even than that of this latter 

 species. There is something of the Gadwall in it, but it wants the 

 ease of this. It flies much lower, too, and, as already mentioned, 

 much more readily resettles after being disturbed. I have hardly 

 ever seen them swimming in the open, and in the rushes they make, 

 of course, slow progress. When wounded they dive, but for no great 

 distance, and then persistently hold on under water in any clump of 

 rush or weed, with only their bills above water. I have never seen 

 them on land in a wild state, but some captured birds, whose wings 

 had been clipped, walked very lightly and easily ; and though they 

 had been but a few days in confinement, they were very tame, and 

 could, I should imagine, be easily domesticated. 



" In Spain, they are described as very wary, and there they seem 

 to frequent open water; here they avoid this latter as a rule, and 

 are, I should say, amongst the tamer of our ducks. 



"Their food is very varied here. Favier says that, in Tangiers, 

 they feed on winged insects ; in Sind, the major portion of their 

 food consists of leaves, shoots, rootlets, corms and seeds of aquatic 

 plants, intermingled with worms, fresh-water shells, insects of all 

 kinds and their larvae. I believe I found a small frog in the stomach 

 of one, but it is not noted on the tickets of any of the specimens 

 now in the Museum, and I cannot be quite sure." 



