PRELIMINARY CLASSIFIED NOTES 441 



locality in Donegal, where it has been much persecuted. Outside the British Isles 

 it breeds in the Faeroes, Iceland, and Spitsbergen ; also on the Continent in the 

 fjeld lakes of Southern Scandinavia, and generally in the north ; in Finland and in 

 Russia from Kolguev and Novaya Zemlya south to Lakes Onega and Ladoga, Ilmen, 

 and the Novgorod and Perm governments. In Asia it ranges north to the Taimyr 

 and the New Siberian Islands east to Kamtschatka, the Commander Isles, and 

 probably Saghalien, but its southern limits are uncertain, though it breeds in the 

 Tobolsk government. In America it breeds in Greenland, and from Labrador and 

 Newfoundland to Alaska. On migration it ranges south to the Mediterranean, 

 Algeria, and Lower Egypt, as well as to the Black and Caspian Seas ; to Japan, 

 China, and Formosa in Asia ; and in America to California, Maine, and Florida. 

 [F. c. R. j.] 



3. Migration. Resident in parts of northern Scotland (see preceding 

 paragraph), and has also nested in Donegal, but found round all the British coasts 

 from autumn to spring in numbers that point to a considerable influx of winter 

 visitors from more northerly lands, while some pass south to the coasts of Western 

 Europe and to the Mediterranean. Its appearance as a winter visitor to our coasts 

 may take place as early as 13th August, but usually about 12th September (cf. 

 Clarke, Studies in Bird Migration, 1912, p. 162) ; its numbers diminish very early 

 in spring, but examples are commonly met with in April, and often in May. Im- 

 mature birds are more commonly met with than adults. Sometimes gregarious as 

 a migrant ; in Ireland it has been described as flying southwards in October in 

 flocks of five or six, uttering its strange call, while at least fifty were observed 

 flying south-eastwards off Yorkshire in advance of an approaching storm on 20th 

 September 1883 (cf. Thompson, in Ussher and Warren, B. of Ireland, 1900, p. 375 ; 

 and Nelson, B. of Yorks., 1907, p. 737). On Heligoland this bird occasionally 

 " occurs in inconceivable quantities, as, for instance, on the 2nd and 3rd of Decem- 

 ber 1879, when there was a moderate east wind, with about 13 F. of frost. . . . 

 At a distance of about two miles from the island, as far as the eye or the telescope 

 could reach, these birds were seen moving in one incessant stream, all of them, 

 strange to say, travelling towards the north-east. This migration lasted till about 

 noon, and was repeated on the next day in the same manner and in the same 

 gigantic proportions " (Gatke, Vogelwarte Helgoland, Eng. trans., 1895, p. 576). 

 [A. L. T.] 



4. Nest and Eggs. The nesting-site of this Diver is very often on the 

 margin of a small lake rather than on an island. Although in many cases the nest 



