CI. 

 ANAS HISTRIONICA. (Linn. 



Harlequin Duck. 



The infoiination of my friend, Mr. G. C. Atkinson, affords 

 me an opportunity of correcting the errors into which orni- 

 thologists have fallen, regarding the eggs of the Harlequin 

 Duck. Mr. Selby and Mr. Gould having stated that they 

 are white ; the former adding that they are not much larger 

 than those of a Pigeon, a circumstance by no means likely. 



The drawing is from some eggs in the Newcastle museum, 

 obtained in Iceland by Mr. Atkinson ; they were brought to 

 him whilst at the Geysers, together with the bird, shot from 

 the nest ; he had afterwards himself also the satisfaction of 

 finding a nest, containing either seven or eight eggs, depo- 

 sited in a bed of the bird's down, upon the grass, bordering 

 the margin of a shallow lake, and within a few yards of the 

 nest of a Long-tailed Duck, which contained eleven eggs. 

 The down in the nest of both of these birds, Mr. Atkinson 

 remarks, is much more pure than that of the Eider Duck, and 

 more free from those pieces of dried grass, mixed with the 

 down of the latter. 



ANAS SPECTABILIS. (Linn.) 



King Duck. 



The capture of one specimen only, in this country, gives 

 the King Duck a place in the list of our British birds. It is 

 abundant in Greenland and Spitzbergen ; and, as stated by 



