132 GREAT CRESTED GREBE. Class II. 



These birds frequent the Meres of Shropshire 

 and Cheshire, where they breed, and the great 

 East Fen in Lincolnshire, where they are called 

 Gaunts. Their skins are made into lippets, 

 which are sold at as high a price as those that 

 come from Geneva. 



This species lays four eggs, white, and of the 

 , size of those of a pigeon j the nest is formed of 

 the roots of buckbean, stalks of water lilly, pond 

 weed, and water violet, floating independent 

 among the reeds and flags ; the water penetrates 

 it, and the bird sits and hatches the eggs in that 

 wet condition ; the nest is sometimes blown from 

 among the flags into the middle of the water : in 

 these circumstances, the fable of the Halcyon s 

 nest, iisjluciivaga domus, as Statius expresses 

 it, may in some measure be vindicated. 



Fluctivagam sic saepe domum, madidosque penates 

 , Halcyone deserta gemit; cum pignora saevus 



Auster, et algentes rapuit Thetis invida nidos. 



Thebaid. lib. ix. 360. 



It is a careful nurse of its young, being ob- 

 served to feed them most assiduously, com- 

 monly with small eels; and when the infant 

 brood are tired, will carry them either on its 

 back or under its wings. This bird preys on 

 fish, and is almost perpetually diving ; it does 



