466 THE TAME DUCK. 



of a Spaniel. The White Call Duck has a yellow-orange bill, 

 that of the Aylesbury should be flesh-coloured. 



There is also the White Hook-billed Duck, with a bill 

 monstrously curved downwards, not upwards, as some writers 

 have it, but Roman-nosed Ducks in short, with features like 

 Cruikshank's Jews, of a most grotesque and ludicrous appear- 

 ance. It may be superfluous to remind the reader, that White 

 Ducks make but a sorry figure in towns or dirty suburbs, or 

 anywhere that the means of washing themselves are scanty. 

 But Hook-billed Ducks are nothing new. Albin, in 1738, 

 published coloured figures of both sexes, which look much as 

 if they had a right to claim the rank of a species. The lines 

 of small white specks on the head, as he describes them, are 

 remarkable. The bill has some resemblance in its curvature 

 to that of the Flamingo. He says, " These Ducks are better 

 layers than any of the other, either wild or tame." 



The cottagers living on the northern coast of Norfolk, have 

 one or two varieties that are very pretty, and are not usual, 

 one of a slate-gray or bluish dun, another of a sandy yellow; 

 there are some also with top-knots* which rival the Hook- 

 billed Duck in oddity. 



Of mottled and pied sorts there exist a great variety ; black 

 and white, brown and white, lightly speckled, and many other 

 mixtures. The Rouen Duck of Poultry-books can hardly be 

 separated from this miscellaneous rabble, and ought to be per- 

 mitted to return to its original obscurity in the multitude. It 

 is wrong to lead people to pay high prices for them as stock ; 

 and we are quite at a loss to discover in them any unusual 

 merit or other describable peculiarity. They appear to be 



* " Some of the tufted tame Ducks, near Salisbury, are very hand- 

 some, having crests as compact and spherical as any Polish Fowl ; 

 but whether this is, or was, any distinct variety, I will not under- 

 take to say." H H. 



