THE TEAL. 223 



The teal, when fat, is one of the most delicate birds 

 that forms part of a second course of a dinner party, 

 and, considering how small they are, they fetch a high 

 price in the London market. The male teal weighs 

 about twelve ounces, the female nine ; the length is 

 fourteen inches, the breadth twenty-three ; the bill is a 

 dark lead colour, tipped with black ; iride pale hazel ; 

 from the bill to the hind part of the head is a brown 

 bar of glossy changeable green, bounded on the under 

 part with a cream-coloured white line, and edged on the 

 upper side with a pale brown ; the rest of the head and 

 the upper part of the neck are of a deep reddish chest- 

 nut ; fore part of the neck and breast a dusky white, 

 marked with roundish black spots; belly white, middle 

 of the vent black, the wing coverts brown, quills dusky ; 

 the exterior webs of the lesser marked with a vivid green 

 spot, above that anoth^- of black, and edged with 

 white ; the legs dull lead colour. 



The female is of a brownish ash colour ; the lower 

 part of the neck and sides over the wing brown, edged 

 with white. The wing has a green spot like the male, 

 the belly white ; it was at no very distant period sup- 

 posed not to breed in England ; but Mr. White, in his 

 " Natural History of Selborne," has established the fact 

 that they do breed in this country, as some young teal 

 were brought to him which were taken in a pond near 

 Walmer Forest. It has also been ascertained that they 

 breed in the mosses about Carlisle; and Mr. Daniel 

 turned some out on the ponds at \N^altham Hall, which 

 he received from the decoys, after having them pinioned, 

 which also bred there. In France, where it stays 

 throughout the year, it makes its nest in April, among 

 the rushes on the edges of ponds, which is composed of 



