THE WINTER DUCK. 339 



all meat is appetizing but at the comfortable dinner- 

 table, with all appliances and means to boot, at Penetan- 

 gui shine, whither we conveyed onr booty, one of the 

 most delicious duck I ever tasted, and not unworthy to 

 be named alongside of the royal Canvas-back himself. 

 It was not, in the least degree, fishy or sedgy ; but rich, 

 succulent, delicate, and melting in the mouth, like the 

 fiesh of the fattest duck that ever fed in the Gunpowder 

 or the Potomac the cause of which undoubtedly is 

 this, that in both localities, the food of the fowl is the 

 same, the seeds of the wild-rice, zizania panicula effusa^ 

 the wild- celery, valisneria Americana, and the eel-grass, 

 xostera marina ; all which, or varieties of them, are 

 universally found in all the flats and mud-lakes of that 

 region. 



On our return to convenient quarters, I immediately 

 set myself to work to dissect a sufficient number of these 

 fine fowl to satisfy myself as to the distinctions' of the 

 sexes as to plumage and coloring ; to take careful meas- 

 urements, and draw up accurate descriptions ; besides 

 making a close and correct drawing of the bird from 

 nature. From all that I have since been enabled to 

 collect, I am well satisfied that this is a new and unde- 

 scribed sea-duck from the arctic regions. I have never- 



O 



found any one, though I have consulted many sportsmen 

 and naturalists, who is acquainted with the bird south- 

 east of the straits of Mackinaw. At Detroit it is 

 unknown, as also on the Canada shores, and that to 



