KRITISH BIRDS. 333 



shades of pale ash, and ash brown, and are prettily 

 marked with delicately freckled, or more distinctly 

 pencilled transverse dark waved lines: the bastard 

 wings, greater coverts, and the exterior webs of the 

 first two or three primary quills, (the interior webs 

 of which are brownish ash,} and the tips of all the 

 rest, are deep brown, more or less sprinkled with 

 white, and crossed with narrow waved white lines: 

 some of the primary quills towards the body, are 

 white: the bases of the secondaries, of the same 

 colour, form an oblique bar across the wings, which 

 is stopped by a single under tertial feather, of plain 

 brown, w r ith green reflections: the belly is white, 

 and shaded off towards' the vent with the same kind 

 of sprinkled and waved lines as those so predo- 

 minant on a large portion of the plumage. The 

 legs are short; toes long, and, as well as the outer 

 or lateral webs of the inner toes, are of a dirty pale 

 blue colour; all the joints' and the rest of the webs 

 are dusky. These birds are said to vary greatly in 

 their plumage, as well as size, but those which have 

 come under the author's observation were all nearly 

 alike. 



The Scaup Duck, like others of the same genus, 

 quits the rigours of the dreary north in the winter 

 months, and in that season only is met with, in small 

 numbers, on various parts of the British shores. 



The female differs so much from the male, as to 

 have been considered a distinct species, and figured 

 as such in the British Miscellany. (Montagu.) 



