446 THE DIVERS 



according to some observers ; but there is great discrepancy when 

 we come to compare the different accounts of the time during which 

 it can remain submerged, probably due to the bird having risen un- 

 observed, in the case of such estimates as that of eight minutes by 

 Holboll and ten minutes by Sir R Payne-Gallvvey. 1 Howard Saunders 

 quotes a statement to the effect that a bird was caught in a trammel- 

 net, thirty fathoms below the water surface, at Looe, and given to 

 Mr. J. Gatcombe. 



The nearest breeding-place of this species to the British Isles is 

 Iceland, and here we found it fairly generally distributed in June 

 1912. As a rule one pair had possession of each good-sized lake, while 

 on the large lakes two pairs might be found, each pair keeping to its 

 own end. Nothing is known of the courtship of this species, which 

 probably takes place at sea before the breeding-grounds are reached. 

 Pairing might be expected to take place on the water, but in the 

 case of the closely allied blackthroated species it has been shown 

 that it is performed on the nest, and year after year the birds 

 return to the same nesting-place or within a few yards of it, so that 

 presumably they pair for life. When islands are available they are 

 generally preferred as nesting-sites, but at times nests may be found 

 on little peninsulas or headlands jutting into the lake. One, which 

 contained a couple of fine dark eggs on llth June, was simply a big 

 depression in the turf, flattened out by the weight of the bird into a 

 shallow depression about eighteen inches across. Close by it was a 

 broad, smooth track, leading by a gentle slope up to the big tussock on 

 which the eggs were laid. Up this slope the incubating bird laboriously 

 pushed herself on her breast with the help of her feet, and down it 

 she slid rapidly into the water when alarmed. 2 Other nests, however, 

 contain in some cases a little grass and a few stalks carelessly arranged ; 



1 Mr. H. Blake Knox states that a wounded bird was still alive after submersion for a quarter 

 of an hour, but was dead when examined after twenty-five minutes. 



2 Mr. J. R. Whitaker informs me that on one occasion in Newfoundland he found one of 

 these birds incubating its eggs thirty yards from the water's edge, but this abnormal site was 

 due to the gradual fall in the level of the lake. 



