BIKDS OF ICELAND 59 



The drake Pochard may be recognised — if any one 

 ever meets with him in Iceland again — by his chest- 

 nut head and neck ; black breast ; shoulders and back 

 white, finely vermiculated with black ; dull grey alar 

 speculum ; bill black, with a broad blue-grey band 

 across the middle. Length nearly 20 inches, wing 

 8J inches. The female is dingy brown with some 

 approach to the finely-lined white mantle, and a white 

 chin. 



Pochards live a good deal on fresh water, and are 

 then, though diving-ducks, excellent for the table; in 

 the winter on the sea they grow fishy in flavour, like 

 the rest of the diving kind, and are about as acceptable 

 on the dinner-table as a Scaup.] 



^ [Fuligula nyroca (Giildenstadt). 

 White-eyed Duck. 



Nati've name : none. 



Mohr (Forsof/) states that he met with this bird 

 on one of the northern rivers in 1780, or 1781. Faber 

 {Proclromus, pp. 72-73) relates that he saw a flock of 

 White-eyed Ducks on the EyjafjurSr on May 20, 1820, 

 and subsequently found a nest which he believed to 

 be of this species. Lastly on March 10, 1821, he saw 

 another flock at Eyrarbakka in Arnes-Sysla. Grondal 

 merely relates these items without comment, and 

 Professor Newton seems somewhat sceptical also. The 

 bird has never even bred in Britain, and is very rare 

 north of the Baltic. Thoudi Faber is most careful 



