PLATE I 

 MALLARD. Anas bo seas 



Aftiy is/, 1896. The nest from which this Plate is taken was built on a small 

 rocky island on Loch Ard, Perthshire. It was very artfully concealed among 

 some very rank, long heather, under a small Scotch fir-tree on the top of a 

 rock, and was a mere hollow in the peaty soil, lined with a few bits of heather, 

 small sticks, and a little down. The bird sat very close, and I got within a 

 foot or two of her before she rose and flew hurriedly away. 



This spot was usually occupied by a Red-breasted Merganser's nest, but 

 on this occasion the Mallard had evidently been the first-comer. We waited 

 about for some little time, fishing along the shore, but she did not return as 

 long as we were there, though we saw the drake disporting himself in a little 

 sheltered bay, splashing about in the water and preening his feathers. 



The first eggs in this nest hatched out on the twenty-first day after I 

 found it with five eggs, two of the nine eggs did not hatch out at all, and 

 I found one young bird dead near the nest. I saw the duck with five young 

 ones swimming near the island, so she must have lost another young bird 

 somehow. 



VOL. II. Y 8 1 



