518 ORNITHOLOGY AND OOLOGY. 



sail-boat or float, pursues these birds with great activity. 

 On approaching one of these large flocks, it is customary to 

 steer the boat to the windward of it ; for they, like most 

 other fowls, always rise to the windward. When, therefore, 

 the gunner arrives within gunshot, he fires into the flock 

 while it is in the water ; and when it rises, and flies to the 

 windward, often directly over his boat, he pours into it 

 sometimes three or four other charges before it gets out 

 of shot. It is a difficult bird to kill ; and, when wounded, it 

 always dives and clings to the bottom, where it dies. I once 

 brought down seven birds out of a flock at one discharge, 

 when they dove, and I did not secure one. Its flesh is oily 

 and strong, and is in no repute for the table. 



MELANETTA, Boie. 



Feathers extending nearly as far forward on the sides of the bill as the nostril, 

 leaving the edges only free from the base ; bill very broad ; nail broad and almost 

 truncate. 



MELANETTA VELVETINA. — 5«iV(f. 

 The Velvet Duck; White-winged Coot. 



Anas fusca, Wilson. Am. Om., VIIL (1814) 137. 



Fuligula {Oidemia) fusca, Bonaparte. Syn. (1828), 390. Nutt. Man., IL 

 (1834) 419. 



Fuligula fusca, Audubon. Om. Biog., IIL (1835) 354. lb.. Birds Am., VL 

 (1843) 332. 



Description. 



If ale. — Bill very broad, wider towards the tip than at the base ; feathers extend- 

 ing far along the side of the bill, and on the forehead, for nearly half the commissure, 

 running in an obtuse point about as far forward as the lower corner of the outline of 

 feathers on the side, both reaching nearly to the posterior border of the large, open, 

 nearly rounded nostrils; culmen horizontal a little beyond the frontal feathers, then 

 abruptly bent downwards, nearly perpendicularly, to the much-depressed, nearly 

 horizontal portion ; a sharp indented ridge along the base of culmen, ending in a 

 trihedral tubercle; color black; a white elongated patch around and a little behind 

 the eye, and a large white speculum on the wing, composed of white secondaries 

 and tips of greater coverts ; bill black at base and lateral edges ; red elsewhere ; iris 

 bright-yellow. 



Female. — Somewhat similar, but lighter beneath ; a large whitish patch on the 

 side of the head behind the eye, but none around it ; wings with white speculum, 

 somewhat as in the male ; bill also similar, but less swollen and elevated at base. 



