GREAT CRESTED GREBE. 103 



169. BED-BREASTED MERGANSER (Mergus serrator). 



Red-breasted Goosander. This handsome bird is an undoubted 

 denizen of our country during the breeding season, but in no 

 great numbers in any year or district. It breeds in Ireland, on 

 islands in several of the Loughs; also in the Hebrides and other 

 Scottish islands. The nest is made of long grass or moss, small 

 roots, dry water-herbage, mixed and lined with the bird's own 

 down, doubtless added to as incubation proceeds. It is often 

 placed at the foot of a tree, if there be one on the islet selected. 

 The eggs are six to nine in number, of a pale buff or fawn- 

 colour. They are 2J inches long by If broad. 



270. GOOSANDER. (Mergus merganser). 

 Dun Diver, Sparling Fowl, Jacksaw, Saw-bill. A few of 

 these birds also remain to breed in Britain, though by far the 

 most retire to the north of Europe for that purpose. Its nests 

 are common in both the Orkney Islands and the Hebrides. They 

 are large, made of dry grass and roots, and lined with the down of 

 the female, and placed amid bushes or stones, or in some cavity 

 afforded by an old tree. The eggs rarely exceed six or seven, 

 not varying much in shade from those last described, and are 2^- 

 inches in length, by nearly If in breadth, 



II. COLYMBUm 



271. GREAT CRESTED GREBE. (Podiceps eristatus). 



Cargoose, Loon, Greater Loon, Tippet grebe. We have come 

 now to the Divers properly so called, and the family of Grebes 

 to be noticed first are to be looked upon as principally, but not 

 exclusively, frequenting the fresh water. The bird now under 

 notice remains almost all the year on the large sheets of water 

 which it inhabits in Wales, Shropshire, Norfolk, and Lincolnshire. 

 Like the rest of the Grebes, it is little able to walk and not much 

 disposed to fly, but possessing marvellous capacity and power of 

 diving. Its nest is made of a large heap of half rotten water- 

 weeds, but little raised above the surface of the water, and 

 always soaked with wet. On this likely-seeming place for duly 

 addling every egg deposited, three, four or five eggs are laid, 

 which arc almost white when newly dropped, but soon become so 

 stained from constant contact with wet and decaying vegetable 

 substances as to be any colour rather than white. They are 

 about 2^ inches long, by 1^ broad. The eggs, in the absence of 

 the parent bird, are usually found covered with portions of some 

 water vegetable ; and the owner, on being disturbed on her nest, 

 always dives away from it. The first lessons of the young Loon 



