624 ORNITHOLOGY AND OOLOGY. 



Description. 



Body and wings black ; the portion anterior to the shoulder joint, interscapular 

 region in part, most of neck and throat, white; the jiigulum with a creamy tinge; a 

 narrow border to the frontal processes of the bill and their interspace; small space 

 round the eye and a V-shaped mark on the chin black; top of head and nape 

 bluish-ash, slightly spotted with black; middle wing coverts, tips of secondaries, 

 axillars, and most of under surface of wing, with a patch on each side of the rump, 

 white; sides of head glossed with transparent emerald-green; the scapulars have 

 the black tinged with slate. 



Length, twenty-one and fifty one-hundredths inches; wing, ten and seventy one- 

 hundredths; tarsus, one and eighty -six one-hundredths: commissure, two and 

 fifty-three one-hundredths inches. 



The King Eider is a rare species on our coast in the 

 winter months. It is a more northern species than the pre- 

 ceding, and seldom reaches as far south as the coast of 

 Massachusetts. It is of similar habits with the other Sea 

 Ducks, and breeds in the most northern sections of the 

 country. The eggs found by Captain James Clark Ross, 

 R.N., measure 2| inches by 1|, have a smooth shell, and are 

 of a uniform dull-greenish color. 



Sub-Family Erismaturin^. 



The most prominent character of the ErismaturincB is found in the very rigid tail 

 feathers with the much abbreviated coverts, which leave the greater portion of the 

 tail exposed. There are peculiarities in the nail at the end of the bill in Erismatura 

 not foimd in the other sub-families. 



ERISMATURA, Bonapakte. 



Erismatura, Bonapakte, Saggio, etc. (1832). 



Bill broad, rather high at the base, much depressed, and bent upwards; upper 

 lateral angle of bill running back on the forehead some distance, farther than the 

 lower edge of the bill; nostrils reaching to the middle of the bill, rather small; por- 

 tion of nail seen from above very narrow and linear; bent abruptly downwards and 

 backwards at the tip, so as to be invisible from the upper surface ; tarsi very short, 

 scarcely more than one-third the long feet; tail very stiff, of eighteen feathers; 

 the coverts above and below very much abbreviated, so as to expose the greater 

 part of the tail; the feathers narrow, linear; the shafts very large, and channelled 

 on the under surface near the base ; wings very short, and incurved at the end. 



