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but the rounded hinder scapulars have light edges, and the foremost darker ones have whitish grey- 

 tips on the shafts which encroaches on the dark colour ; both the scapulars and coverts have dark 

 shafts ; some of the upper tail-coverts have greyish white points tinged with yellowish ; hinder part of 

 the back and sides of the rump brownish with a yellowish grey tinge ; entire underparts and larger 

 wing-coverts pure white; innermost secondaries deep black, rounded at the tip." Dr. Palmen adds in 

 a note that the old male in summer dress may be easily distinguished from the young birds and female 

 by its pure white wing-coverts. 



During the summer season the Golden-eye inhabits the northern portions of both the Nearctic 

 and Palsearctic Regions, being circumpolar in its range ; and at the approach of winter it migrates 

 southward, and is at that season to be met with as far south as the northern shores of the African 

 continent. 



In Great Britain it is known only as a winter visitant, being tolerably numerous on our 

 coasts during the coldest season of the year ; but old males are seldom seen. Occasionally it is 

 to be met with in the interior of our island, but less frequently than on the sea-coast. I find it 

 recorded from various parts of the south coast of England. Mr. J. C. Mansel-Pleydell says that 

 it never appears in large flocks off the coast of Dorset, but in groups of about a dozen ; specimens 

 are killed at Weymouth almost every year ; and they are seen most winters in Kimmeridge Bay. 

 Mr. Cecil Smith records it as of not unfrequent occurrence on the Somersetshire coast ; and 

 Lord Lilford, writing from Lilford, Northants, says, " One or two in immature plumage generally 

 make their appearance on our river (the Nene) close to this house in October. We occasionally 

 see a few during severe weather in December and January, and almost invariably one or two 

 adult males in the latter end of February or the beginning of March, whatever may be the state 

 of the weather at that period. I have never seen the Golden-eye here associate with other 

 species, except in one instance, when a fine adult male kept company for some weeks with three 

 Goosanders which visited us in the sharp frost of February 1871." Mr. Stevenson informs 

 me that it is common on the coast of Norfolk, but, as elsewhere, chiefly in immature plumage. 

 Occasionally young birds have been seen far inland, as at Earlham, near Norwich, consorting 

 with freshwater fowl ; and, according to Mr. Lubbock, a pair have been known to remain as late 

 as the 12th May. According to Mr. Cordeaux (B. of Humber Dist. p. 175), except in unusually 

 severe seasons, it can scarcely be considered a common bird in the Humber, where small parties 

 are met with each season, arriving about the middle of October, and leaving late in March or 

 early in April. In Scotland, Mr. Robert Gray states (B. of W. of Scotland, p. 395), it is 

 " commonly distributed over the whole of the west, being a regular winter visitant to all the 

 sea-lochs of the mainland, from Wigtownshire to Cape Wrath, and also the sounds and lakes of 

 both groups of islands." On the east side of Scotland it is also common ; and Mr. Gray says 

 that it "probably breeds occasionally in Sutherlandshire, as specimens have been seen and 

 obtained in that county as late as the end of May. Mr. A. G. More has stated (Ibis, 1865, 

 p. 447) that a pair bred in the hollow of an old larch tree at Loch Assyn ; the nest, with the 

 young birds, was found by a shepherd. Macgillivray states that he has seen pairs on freshwater 

 lochs in Harris in the beginning of May, and stray specimens sometimes linger in Benbecula 

 and North Uist till about the same time." Dr. Saxby believes that it also breeds in Shetland ; 



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