fir //era! Motes. [January 



GENERAL NOTES. 



An Early Date of a Rare Bird in South Carolina. — I shot on October 15, 

 1S89, at Mt. Pleasant. S. C, a young male Red-throated Diver (Urinator 

 liim/i/e). The bird was very shy, and it was with great difficulty that 

 secured it. It was in good condition, and had apparently been in the 

 neighborhood for some time, as it was seen several times at a distance. 

 but it was mistaken for a Florida Cormorant. The Red-throated Diver 

 is one of the rarest of the winter birds that visit South Carolina. During 

 the severe winter of 1SS6 several were taken, but they have not been 

 found here since. This early date of capture is certainly surprising, 

 as they have only been seen for a few weeks in January. — Arthur T. 

 Wayne, Charleston, S. C. 



The Mottled Duck in Kansas. — In my 'Revised Catalogue of the Birds of 

 Kansas' I entered this bird as the Florida Duck (Anas fulvigula) . Mr. 

 Sennett, in the July number of 'The Auk' for 18S9. describes a new Duck 

 from Texas, viz., Mottled Duck (Anas maculosa) to which, I find upon 

 examination, the Kansas bird should be referred, instead of to the Florida 

 Duck as given. — N. S. Goss, Topeka, Kansas. 



Capture of the Widgeon (A/ias penelofe) on the James River. Virginia. 

 — At Washington Market, New York City, on January 25, 1879, I saw a 

 male Widgeon among a lot of American Ducks which had just been 

 received from a gunner on the James River, Virginia, by a dealer who 

 was positive that the Widgeon had been killed with the other Ducks, as 

 he had never handled any foreign game. The specimen was exhibited, 

 in the flesh, to the Linnsan Society of New York, and is now in the col- 

 lection of the American Museum of Natural History. New York. It is a 

 young adult, and can be exactly matched in size and coloration from a 

 series of Widgeons from Europe. Its fresh measurements were as fol- 

 lows: length, 495 mm.; alar expanse, 850 mm.; wing, 244mm.; tail, 

 102 mm.; culmen, 35 mm.; tarsus, 39mm. — Edgar A. Mearns, M. D., 

 Fort S/ielI///g. Minn. 



The King Eider (Somater/'a spectabilis~) at Erie, Pennsylvania. — The 

 great storm of Nov. 28 and 29, 1889, on the Great Lakes, brought into the 

 Bay of Erie a flock of fifteen to twenty King Eider Ducks. They were 

 seen about noon of Nov. 30 swimming in close to the Iron Ore Dock where 

 numbers of men were at work unloading vessels. The hunters were soon 

 down on the dock with guns and others put out in boats. So fearless or 

 stupid were the Ducks that it was no trouble to shoot them, and at one 

 discharge three were killed. Mr. James Thompson very kindly took two 

 of the birds home with him and telephoned me that some very queer 

 looking Ducks had been shot that day. placing at my disposal the pair he 



