540 BRITISH BIRDS. 



as is usual in cases of this kind, it requires a considerable stretch of imagi- 

 nation to recognize the similarity. The cry of this Duck is a loud pro- 

 longed 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 it startles the 

 ear on the margin of a mountain-tarn or moorland lake, a solitary cry, very 

 high in key, not unmusical in tone, but loud and piercing, one of the most 

 familiar sounds on the banks of the Petchora and the Yenesay, where the 

 Wigeon is very abundant, especially on the lakes and swamps of the 

 borderland where the forest merges into the tundra not far north of the 

 Arctic circle. The Wigeon has other notes which are not so often heard ; 

 one may be represented by kr-r and is not unlike the note of the Tufted 

 Duck, and Naumann says that when suddenly flushed it utters a note like 

 that of the Shoveller. 



The Wigeon is a very gregarious bird, and on migration sometimes 

 collects into flocks of enormous size. In the breeding-season it consorts 

 with Teal, Pintail, Scaup, Scoter, and other Ducks which breed in the 

 high north, and delights in wild wet country where the forests are almost 

 overpowered by swamps, lakes, rivers, bogs, and meadows, and where it 

 can find abundance of both animal and vegetable diet in the insects in all 

 stages, the mollusks, and the buds and seeds of various water-plants. On 

 migration it is specially fond of the sea-coast, frequenting the mud-flats at 

 low tide, and repairing to inland sheets of water where such are to be 

 found to feed upon the grass-wrack. The Wigeon arrives on its breeding- 

 grounds at the earliest possible moment. In these high latitudes summer 

 treads rapidly on the heels of winter : the ice on the great rivers breaks 

 up at the rate of four miles or more an hour, and as soon as any open 

 water is visible it is quickly crowded with thousands of Pintail, Teal, and 

 Wigeon. This rate of progress may not sound very rapid, but a thousand 

 miles in ten days cannot be called slow. The Wigeon are impatient to 

 arrive at their old homes ; before March with its many weathers is over, 

 the earliest arrivals make their appearance in North Germany, and 

 throughout April flock after flock follow the coast or the courses of the 

 great rivers on their way north. Those which remain to breed in South 

 Scandinavia and South Finland begin to lay in the latter half of May, 

 but on the Arctic circle they are, of course, later. On the banks of the 

 Petchora the Wigeon arrived on the 19th of May, and eggs were obtained 

 on the 5th of June ; but in the valley of the Yenesay I saw the first bird 

 on the 6th of June and found eggs twelve days later. The nests are well 

 concealed, generally close to the margin of a lake or a pond, and are placed 

 in the long grass and sedge, often under a willow bush. Like those of 

 most Ducks which breed in the Arctic Region they are very deep, well lined 

 with dead grass and sedge, and when the full clutch is laid contain a 



