YELYET SCOTER. 49 



Its note is a short squeak, by no means, says Audubon, 

 unpleasant to the ear. 



They hatch, it is said, very late seldom before the middle 

 of July. 



Audubon writes of this species, that they 'begin to form 

 their nests from the 1st. to the 10th. of June. The nests 

 are placed within a few feet of the borders of small lakes, a 

 mile or two distant from the sea, and usually under the 

 low boughs of the bushes, of the twigs of which, with 

 mosses and various plants matted together, they are formed. 

 They are large and almost flat, several inches thick, with 

 some feathers of the female, but no down.' They are also 

 found on hummocks, or in long grass among willow swamps. 



The eggs are usually six, but sometimes eight or ten in 

 number, of a uniform pale cream-colour, tinged with green. 

 The males leave the females after incubation has commenced. 



A pair had bred on the same water for six or seven years 

 in succession. The young did not quit the pond until they 

 were able to fly; as soon as that is the case the mother 

 bird escorts them to the sea. 



Male; weight, about three pounds two ounces; length, one 

 foot ten or eleven inches. The bill, which is broad, is yellowish 

 orange margined with black, the base of the upper mandible 

 raised into a knob, also black on the upper part; the tip of 

 the nail darker orange than the remainder. Iris, pale yel- 

 lowish white; behind, and rather lower than the eye, is an 

 angular space of pure white; the eyelids are also white, the 

 eye small. The head, which is large, on the crown, and the 

 neck, nape, chin, and throat, dull black; breast, black; back, 

 intense velvet black. 



The wings, which have the first quill the longest, are crossed 

 by a white bar; with this exception, the whole of the re- 

 mainder of the plumage the same, namely, the greater wing 

 coverts, which are tipped with white, are otherwise, as the 

 lesser wing coverts, primaries, secondaries, with the exception 

 of the white tips, tertiaries, greater and lesser under wing 

 coverts, tail, of fourteen feathers and short, and the tail 

 coverts also intense velvet black. Legs, scarlet red on the 

 inner part, and red with a tinge of oiangt 01. the outer, the 

 joints are stained with black; toes, orange red, claws, black 

 webs, dark brownish black. 



The female is not so large as the mal-. Bill, dusky, the 

 knob at its base is much less than in tht xuaio; between it 

 voi-. vii. E 



