WILD DUCK. 19 



Greater and lesser wing coverts, brown, the lower range 

 having pale brown tips; the speculum is dark g*een, glossed 

 with purple. The tail is wedge-shaped, with the two middle 

 feathers black, narrow, and pointed, and much longer than the 

 others, which are brown, margined with white; upper tail 

 coverts, greenish black, glossed with purple; under tail coverts, 

 also greenish black, with a purple gloss. Legs and toes, pale 

 orange; webs, pale orange. 



Temminck says that the males of this kind appear to vary 

 very much in the degree of purity of the tints of their plumage, 

 and in the colour and form of the two large spots on the 

 neck. One specimen was covered in part only with the 

 variegated plumage of the Mallard, while all the rest was like 

 that of the female, but dotted here and there with some feathers 

 of the male. The top of the head alone exhibited some red 

 colour at the tips of the feathers, the metallic green also being 

 clouded with black at the end of the white feathers. 



