314 COLYMBIDE. 



the opportunity of examining a recently-killed bird is quite 

 accidental. This species is distinguished from the Grebe 

 last described by being a little smaller in size ; in having 

 the bill bent slightly upwards, the curve being most con- 

 spicuous in the lower mandible ; and in the lore, or part 

 between the base of the bill and the eye, never carrying 

 any ferruginous feathers at any age or season. The reddish, 

 or golden-yellow feathers, when present, arise behind the 

 eye, covering the orifice of the ears. In its habits it ap- 

 pears to resemble the Sclavonian Grebe ; it feeds on small 

 fishes, aquatic insects, and some fresh-water plants ; hiding 

 itself and making its nest among thick herbage. The eggs 

 are mostly three or four in number, of a dull yellowish- 

 white, one inch nine lines in length, by one inch and three 

 lines in breadth. 



Mr. Thompson says this species occurs, though but rarely, 

 in Ireland. Colonel Montagu obtained one in Cornwall ; 

 and it has been killed in Dorsetshire, and in Sussex. The 

 bird figured by Edwards in his Gleanings, plate 96, figure 

 2, was taken in a pond at Hampstead, near London ; and 

 Mr. Bond gave me notice of two that were killed in 1841, 

 on the Kingsbury reservoir. Mr. Joseph Clarke sent me 

 an account of one that was taken alive on Duxford common 

 field, and it is included in the catalogues of the Birds of 

 Norfolk and Suffolk. Pennant states that in his time it 

 inhabited the fens near Spalding, in Lincolnshire. Mr. Selby 

 obtains it occasionally in winter on the coast of Northumber- 

 land ; it is found also occasionally in the lake counties on 

 the western side of England. Mr. Macgillivray says he 

 has rarely met with it in Scotland, and it is not included 

 among the birds found in Orkney or in Shetland. 



Faber describes it in his account of the Birds of Iceland ; 

 M. Nilsson says it breeds in Sweden, but only rarely. Lin- 

 neus, in his tour in Lapland, mentions having met with it 



