2o ALLEN'S NATURALIST'S LIBRARY. 



young Wigeon, and the bird in question was supposed to 

 have been hatched in Hampshire, but it was not a young 

 bird at all, but an old male, changing from his short-lived 

 summer plumage to his full dress, and, therefore, he was 

 probably a non-breeding individual which had remained in 

 southern latitudes instead of going north to breed. This I 

 take to be the case with the birds which have been seen in 

 Norfolk and other counties of England during the summer. 



Kange outside the British Islands. Breeds in the Arctic Re- 

 gions of the Old World, from Iceland to Eastern Siberia. 

 It also breeds occasionally in more southern latitudes, and 

 its eggs have been taken on the Lower Danube by Mr. See- 

 bohm, so that the improbability of its breeding in England is 

 lessened, as the same author states that its nests have been 

 found in France, Germany, and Bohemia. The range of the 

 species extends eastwards to Kamtchatka. In winter it ranges 

 south to Abyssinia and to Madeira, as well as to Northern 

 India and the Burmese provinces and China, while stray 

 examples have been met with in Borneo, and even as far south 

 as the Marshall Islands. In North America it is found in 

 Alaska and occurs as for south as California, and it is also 

 found in winter on the Atlantic coasts. 



Habits. In winter, when the Wigeon principally visits our 

 coasts, it is a gregarious bird, and often occurs in enormous 

 flocks on the sea-coasts and also on inland lakes, herding 

 together on the latter with other Ducks, especially the 

 Tufted Duck. The male, as is evidenced by the birds lent to 

 me by Sir Savile Crossley, gets through his summer moult 

 more rapidly than the female, and leaves to the latter the 

 charge of bringing up the young. Lord Lilford says that " the 

 note of the male bird is a shrill double whistle, once heard 

 never to be forgotten," and Mr. Seebohm writes, " The cry 

 of this Duck is a prolonged whistle or scream, immediately 

 followed by a short note. I can best represent it by the 

 syllables mee-yu, the first very loud and prolonged, the last 

 low and short. It sounds very wild and weird, as in startles 

 the ear on the margin of a mountain tarn or moorland lake, a 

 solitary cry, high in key, not unmusical in tone, but one of the 

 most familiar sounds on the banks of the Petchora or the 



