NOTICE OF THE BREEDING OF THE TUFTED DUCK. 39 
coverts, as if it had been banished from society. Singular to re- 
late, its very spurs partake of the character of the female, re- 
sembling rather those of an old domestic hen than the true attri- 
butes of the cock pheasant. 
It is a bird of great size, with a large allowance of the bare 
red skin round the eyes, a distinction which in no case is 
ever observed in the female even where, in all other respects, her 
plumage has become that of the male. 
The description given of this individual specimen may be re- 
ceived as common to all these “ Androgynous” mutations, of 
which a great number have presented themselves to my notice in 
turning out the bags of the present season, in which scarcely any 
young birds escaped the disastrous storms of cold rain during the 
last summer. Every one of the more recent specimens were evi- 
dently birds of great age, and, unlike the example described, they 
all possessed very long and sharp spurs. Several gradations of 
plumage were observed, some partaking more, others less, of the 
female character. 
RAVENSWORTH CASTLE, 28th January, 1861. 
V.—Notice of the Breeding of the Tufted Duck (Anas fuligula) in 
Northumberland. By Joun Hancock. 
In the year 1858, Sir Walter C. Trevelyan, Bart., informed me, 
that a small duck had reared its brood, consisting of eight or nine, 
on a pond near his house at Wallington. Sir Walter again in- 
formed me, in the early part of the following year, that the same 
sort of small duck which had bred at Wallington the previous 
year, was on the pond again. During May of the same year, I 
paid a visit to Wallington, and immediately on my arrival, I 
strolled down to the pond to ascertain if possible what species 
of duck it was. I was not there many minutes, before I ob-- 
served two small ducks on the water at the far side of the pond. 
With the aid of a small telescope, I soon discovered that they 
