BIRDS OF THE HUMBER DISTRICT. 175 



V 



the genus Euccmum, and a few of the beautiful and 

 delicate Patella pellucida. 



Amongst all the varied cries and calls of our 

 numerous seafowl, that of the Hareld is the sweetest, 

 most melancholy, and harplike ; heard from a distance 

 at sea in the spring on a still day it is inexpressibly 

 wild and musical. 



226. CLANGULA GLAUCION (Linnaeus). The 

 Golden-eye. 



Provincial. Rattle-wing. 



Except in unusually severe seasons, the Golden-eye 

 can scarcely be considered a common Duck in the 

 Humber. Small parties of young birds, having a 

 preponderance of young males, with an occasional 

 old female*, are met with each season, arriving in 

 the Humber and along the coast about the middle of 

 October. The mature male bird is always a rare 

 capture, and seldom shot. 



These Ducks swim rather high in the water. They 

 are expert divers. A fine old male, which I watched 

 for nearly an hour on the 26th of January, 1869, 

 swimming and diving in our creek, remained im- 

 mersed, on the average, from forty-five to fifty 

 seconds, continuing on the surface between each dive 



* Mr. Rodd, in the ' Zoologist ' for 1870, p. 2278, remarking 

 on this species, says, l< The Golden-eyes that appear in the far 

 west after and during severe weather are in the proportion of 

 forty out of fifty in the female plumage, or perhaps in the plumage 

 of the first year of each sex." 



