4274 THE ZooLocist—JANUARY, 1875. 
before the re-appearance of the flock, thus gives rise to confusion. The 
student of sea-birds in their native haunts will soon find that almost every 
species which is much given to diving has its characteristic way of taking the 
plunge. One bird, a razorbill for example, will give you the impression 
that it has been suddenly turned topsy-turvy and pulled straight down. 
Another, as the black guillemot, will make a sudden splash with its wings 
as it disappears. The merganser dives by raising the body and plunging 
head foremost, and at a distance may readily be distinguished from the shag, 
which dives in the same manner, by its far more graceful movement—not 
to say by the snake-like neck and long narrow head. 
When watching the merganser diving I have observed that it invariably 
uses its wings as well as its feet; sometimes it descends quite to the bottom, 
stirring the weeds with its bill and darting with astonishing speed after any 
small fish which may chance to show itself. In rising to the surface its own 
buoyancy is quite sufficient; yet I have occasionally seen it give additional 
impetus to its ascent by means of its wings. The latter are always used 
when it is in mid-water examining the rocks, and in that case the hind part 
of the body is always the highest. I have seen the bird in this position, 
just as in surface swimming, as above mentioned, suddenly dart to the 
bottom and seize a fish, the act being followed, as usual, by immediate 
ascent to the surface.” —P. 267. 
So much for the feeding; now for the nesting, which, if not 
entirely new,-has at least the merit of adding greatly to our previous 
knowledge, as recorded by Selby, Jardine, John Macgillivray, and 
Hewitson, all of them observers after my own heart :— 
“The merganser often makes its nest among long grass; but it seems 
to prefer something in the form of a roof; and thus it is that in suitable 
localities the eggs are most commonly found under the rocks, in rabbit- 
burrows, and even in a crevice at the foundation of an old loose wall. What- 
ever be the situation chosen, the nest almost always consists of a hollow 
scraped in the ground, lined to a greater or less extent with down, feathers, 
dead plants, and with heather also, if there happen to be any growing near, the 
amount of material usually being increased as incubation proceeds. Now and 
then it happens that no attempt is made to line the nest until the first few 
eggs have been deposited. I once found a nest—it was about five feet above 
the beach, among tangled masses of dead grass and coarse herbage. Some- 
times, though rarely, the selected spot is beside a small hill loch in a sheltered 
depression where the heather is long; but a very favourite situation is a 
hollow at the foot of a dry bank where the long grass overhangs and the tall 
flags grow close up. The number of eggs is from five to eight, but I have 
several times seen as many as ten. The rich reddish cream-colour of the 
