AMONG THE WaTER Fowt 
be,—and in it three greenish olive eggs,—the largest 
laid by any of the Ducks, nearly as large as Goose 
eggs,—were very cosily bedded. 
When we come as far south as southern New 
England, all we can hope to find of breeding Ducks 
are the Dusky and the Wood Ducks, and it 1s no 
easy matter to find even these. Usually it is more 
by accident than otherwise. On Martha’s Vineyard 
I was once exploring an alder swamp for the home 
of a pair of Marsh Hawks, when a great Dusky 
Duck suddenly whirred up from beneath an alder, 
almost in my face, and I found my first Duck’s 
nest with an even dozen fine eggs. This was the 
second day of June, and they were almost ready 
to hatch Ame 
other time when 
I was exploring 
the rushy edge 
of a pond in Con- 
necticut, I no- 
ticed a dark place 
under» some 
fusdneisy t hvas 
: looked © suspici- 
‘ON PULLING IT APART I FOUND ELEVEN WARM EGGS ously like Duck- 
OF THE DUSKY DUCK.’’ FOUND IN KENT, CONN. =~ 
down. It was 
that, indeed, and on pulling it apart I found eleven 
warm eggs of the Dusky Duck. 
The Wood Duck is the most domestic of all 
the tribe, and is very apt to nest In some most unex- 
pected place, close to human habitations. I knew 
of one nest in a knot-hole of a large maple, only six 
feet from the ground, right on a well-traveled road 
212 
