GREAT NORTHERN DIVER. 213 



alertness that it requires a quick eye and hand to shoot them. 

 They are inhabitants of northern seas ; there they build their 

 nests in some solitary islet or desert promontory, where they 

 lay two eggs, oblong in shape, and more or less shaded of an 

 Isabella white. Fish, particularly the herring, form their prin- 

 cipal food ; crustaceans and marine vegetables are also eaten by 

 them. Their flesh is tough and leathery, and tastes disagree- 

 able. In the winter they migrate to temperate countries, where 

 they frequent the rivers and lakes, returning to the northern 

 regions when the ice has broken up. 



There are three species described : the Great Northern Diver, 

 Colymbus gladalis ; the Arctic Diver ; and the Imber Diver. But 

 there is considerable doubt on this subject, the young of C. gladalis 

 of the first and second year being so unlike the parent birds as to 

 have been long supposed a distinct species. 



THE GREAT NORTHERN DIVER (Colymbus gladalis). 



ENGLISH SYNONYMS. Northern Diver : Montagu, Selby. Speckled Diver, 

 Ember Goose : Gunner. Ring-necked Loon. 



LATIN SYNONYMS. Colymbus gladalis : Linn., Adult, Latham, Jenyns, 

 Brien. Colymbus Immer : Young, Linn., Latham. 



FRENCH SYNONYM. Plongeon Imbrim: Temminck. 



The Great Northern Diver is among the mass of those birds 

 which seek their food on the bosom of the great deep. It is not 

 numerous in British waters, and can scarcely be called gregarious, 

 although adults sometimes, and the young more frequently, form 

 small parties of two to five. A wanderer on the ocean, it not only 

 frequents the margins of the sea, fishing in the bays and estuaries, 

 but it is also met with many miles from the shore. Narrow chan- 

 nels, firths, coves, sea- locks, and sandy bays are, however, its 

 favourite resorts ; there it floats, the body deeply immersed in the 

 water. But though deep in the water, it moves on steadily and 

 majestically ; it overtakes and shoots ahead of all its more buoyant 

 congeners. But let us watch the actions of a pair of these children 

 of the ocean, and listen while Mr. McGillivray describes one of 

 those picturesque scenes in which he delights. "It is now the 





