404 DUCKS. 



upon land in consequence of the backward position of its legs ; its activity, 

 however, in the former element, makes ample amends for this deficiency. It 

 rises with difficulty into the air, but when once on the wing its flight is swift,, 

 and can be sustained for a considerable time. The goosander is a bird oi 

 wild disposition and very wary habits : from its dexterity-and cjuickness in 

 diving it is not easily shot. The flesh, from the nature of its food, is ill 

 flavoured and oily. 



The Red-breasted Merganser {Mcrgiis .wr^'/'z/'j), another British species, 

 like other diving birds, walks awkwardly, in consequence of the shortness and 

 backward position of its legs, but it swims and dives well ; its powers of flight 

 also are very respectable, so that it ranges over a great extent of latitude in 

 the course of the year. The majority of them breed farther to the north, but 

 a few rear their young not only in the more remote Scottish isles, but on the 

 mainland in the marshy and humid districts of Sutherland and Ross. They 

 make their nests on the margin of fresh-water lakes, constructing it of withered 

 grass and down from their own breasts. The eggs, from eight to twelve in 

 number, are of a smooth shining buff colour. 



The Hooded Merganser {Mcrgus cucullatus) is an American species, 

 frequenting the fresh waters of that country much more than the sea, retiring 

 to the north in summer to breed, but in winter ranging as far southward, per- 

 haps, as the Floridas. In Britain it appears only as a very rare straggler. 



The Smew, "White Nun, or White Merganser, is, like the preceding, 

 a northern bird, and perhaps the most discursive of any of them. It is abun- 

 dant on our shores in the winter, but has not been known to breed in this 

 country. On the eastern parts of the continent, and also in America, it ranges 

 much farther than in our longitudes, because the waters northward are closed 

 by the frost earlier and to a greater extent. The consequence is that many 

 of the Arctic birds arc as common in the Mediterranean as they arc on the 

 southern shores of England, to which it is only in very severe weather that any 

 of the mergansers are driven in even moderate numbers. The markings of 

 the smew are very striking. It is a bird of elegant form, and the pure black 

 and white of its plumage renders it a very conspicuous object as it alternately 

 plays on the surface and dives in the water. 



FAMILY IT. 

 THE DIVERS. COLYMBID/E. 



General Characteristics. — Bill more or less long, much compressed, straight, and 

 acute ; the nostrils placed in a longitudinal groove, with the opening basal, linear, 

 or rounded; the winj^s moderate, with the first quill longest; the tail very short; 

 the tarsi short and much compressed ; the toes long, and the three anterior ones 

 more or less united together by a membrane, the hind toes short, and margined by 

 a small membrane. 



The birds of this family display a fitness for diving cv^en more 

 decided than is to be found cither in the diviner ducks or in the 



