298 THE WILD DUCK. 



domestic ducks, we shall only briefly touch upon 

 them. They resort together in flocks during the 

 winter, and fly in pairs during the summer. The 

 velvet ducks are seen more in summer than in 

 winter. Ducks' nests are constructed easily, among 

 heath and rushes of their favourite localities, not far 

 from the water ; where they will lay twelve or four- 

 teen eggs before they sit : the hen remains on them 

 about thirty days, when the birds burst forth to take 

 their first tumble in the water. An old duck is often 

 a cunning bird, and will make her nest a considerable 

 distance from the water for safety ; she has been 

 known to do so upon an oak tree, five and twenty 

 feet from the ground : a perilous proceeding for the 

 young birds, whose wing feathers are of the slowest 

 growth. Here they were dependent on the tender- 

 ness of their parent, to convey them, in her beak or 

 feet, to the water, their necessary element. Wild 

 ducks breed with us, but not in great quantities. 

 The gamekeepers of Mr. Eyre, of Passop, Derby- 

 shire, in 1801, observed a wild duck fly out of a large 

 oak, in which, the year preceding, there was a hawk's 

 nest ; the nest was found to be in complete repair, and 

 contained two eggs recently laid by the duck in it. 



The nest, whether high or low, is composed of 

 singular materials. The longest grass, mixed with 

 heath, and lined within with the bird's own feathers, 

 will sometimes be the composition ; although, in pro- 

 portion to the climate, the nest is more or less arti- 

 ficially made. The duck in the Arctic regions will 



