144 BRITISH BIRDS. WITH THEIR NESTS AND EGGS 



Duck is that made by Mr. W. Eagle Clarke, ("Ibis," 1895, p. 203), from 

 notes taken by him in the south-western Camargue, in May, 1894. On an island 

 in one of the shallow etangs they came upon a nest with the female ou ; " this 

 was placed in the centre of a thick tangled mass of purslane (Atrip/ex portulacoides) 

 so dense that it was reached by a covered way, two feet in length, worked in the 

 shrub where it rested on the soil ; the nest was on the ground, and consisted of 

 a broad rim of down, with a few short dry tamarisk twigs, and contained ten fresh 

 eggs. A few yards further on another duck of this species was disturbed this 

 time from under an immense shrub of seablite, quite four feet in height and as 

 many in diameter. The nest in all respects resembled the last, and contained 

 seventeen eggs of two distinct types, and probably the production of different 

 females. The eggs of one set were white and were all singularly mal-formed. 

 The normal eggs are of clear pea-green, and a trifle smaller than those of the 

 Pochard. The down in the nest closely resembles that of the Eider-Duck in tint. 

 Both nests were about six yards from the water, and the birds wriggled off at 

 our feet." 



All who have had the advantage of seeing the male bird in a state of nature 

 speak of its exceeding beauty. Mr. A. B. Brooke, who saw it in Sardinia, says : 

 " the males have a peculiarly handsome appearance in the water, with their bright- 

 red bills and black breast plates shining and glistening in the sun as if they were 

 polished." Mr. W. Eagle Clarke and his companion " were at once much impressed 

 with the extreme beauty of these birds, which greatly exceeded our conception 

 formed from cabinet specimens and portraits. We particularly noticed that the 

 elongated feathers of the head, as seen under the brilliant sunlight, appeared to 

 be fringed with gold." 



The late Mr. John Henry Gurney, describing one of the Norfolk specimens 

 killed in the winter of 1844, and now in the Norwich Museum, says : " when 

 newly killed it was as beautiful a bird as I have ever seen ; the beak was of a 

 most splendid vermilion-red colour, the nail of the beak being also red, but paler 

 than the rest. The colouring of the beak began to fade soon after the bird was 

 mounted, as also did another beauty which was apparent when the bird was first 

 killed, and which consisted of a wonderfully elegant tinge of rose colour, which 

 pervaded the whole of the white part of the plumage, especially the two large 

 patches on the back above the shoulders." ("Zoologist," Vol. II, p. 576). 



Some of the most beautiful tints in birds, particularly those of the soft parts, 

 are lost very rapidly after death. The faded and badly set-up specimens in 

 some Museums, are but miserable caricatures of nature when matched against 

 the living creature in all the brightness and freshness of glorious life. I was 



