ANATID^. 127 



many altercations, and return to land. After a short 

 respite, the birds having again collected together on 

 that or some other neighbouring lake, a second 

 advance takes place in the same manner, and the 

 day is passed in making a succession of attacks, each 

 followed by a retreat for a time to allow the birds to 

 reassemble.'* 



The Scoter has been observed on the reservoirs 

 near Tring and Drayton Beauchamp ; and in the 

 winter of 1862, a specimen of this bird was shot 

 while flying over a piece of ornamental water at 

 Datchet, and was taken for preservation to one of the 

 Eton birdstufifers. Another was procured near Cook- 

 ham, in Berkshire, in the winter of 1865, by a man 

 named Godden, who is employed as a ferryman 

 below Cookham bridge, and passed into the possession 

 of Mr. Charles Venables, by whom it was unfor- 

 tunately not preserved : this bird was a male, in full 

 plumage. Mr. R. B. Sharpe wrote me word of 

 another good example of this species, which was 

 shot on Mr. Palmer's estate, near Reading, in the 

 month of July, 1867, an unusual date for the appear- 

 ance of this bird inland. It was sent to Mr. Briggs, 

 at Cookham, in order to be stuffed, but by the time 

 it reached him it was so much decomposed as to 

 render its preservation hopeless. 



Pochard {Fuligida ferina). The Rev. H. H. 

 Crewe states that this duck is a common winter 



* Yarrell's ' British Birds,' vol. iii., pp. 319, 320. 



