156 ANATID^. 



[golden-eye] by day^ wlien lie dives you must ruji; and the 

 moment lie comes tip, squat down. So you may go on till within 

 ten yards of him, and then stand ready to shoot him as he flies 

 up, which he will do on coming up again and seeing you suddenly 

 appear so close.""^ The only difference in Sir W. Jardine's 

 observations, is, that he has in this manner approached within shot 

 of several " curres " diving simultaneously, t This is also a 

 Connaught practice. Of the golden-eye on inland waters there, it 

 is remarked by a correspondent — " They appear rather early on 

 the rivers, and feed in the shallows and fords. There is a pecu- 

 liarity in the whole flock diving simultaneously : I have many 

 times remained at a distance until they were all down, and then 

 had a run for it, and been within range when they came up. 

 They are not so plentiful as the pochard.'" J I remember being 

 once much amused by witnessing from Ormeau Bridge, over the 

 Lagan, near Belfast, a simultaneous operation of the kind de- 

 scribed, on the part of four golden-eyes. They were close to the 

 edge of the river, and so extremely busied feeding as to be 

 generally quite beneath the water, though, fi'om its shallowness, 

 hardly requiring to dive. Their appearance at the surface was 

 so momentary that they evidently came up only to breathe, and 

 the ra]ndity with which they en masse went beneath it again, was 

 almost ludicrous : the rapid curling of the water above them 

 betrayed of itself a busy scene beneath. 



The golden-eye occasionally resorts to very small ponds as well 

 as rivers — an attack made on one that unfortunately visited a 

 pond at the Falls will be found noticed in the first volume of 

 this work, under Peregrine Falcon. 



The food observed in several of these ducks examined by me 

 in different years from November to March was various : six pro- 

 cured on fresh-water exhibited the remains of subaquatic plants, 

 seeds, insects and their larvse, together with entomostracous Crus- 

 tacea of the genus Cj/pris — of five killed on the sea (Belfast Bay) 

 one included a shrimp with the remains of other Crustacea ; a 



* ' Instructious to Young Sportsmen,' p. 310, 6th edit. 



t ' Brit. Bii-cls,' vol. iv. p. 152. + Mr. G. Jackson. 



