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according to Kjserb oiling, contribute very much more. ' Every nest,' he says, ' contains about 

 the sixth of a pound of down ; ' and, supposing that from each of these countries alone about six 

 thousand pounds are annually exported, it will be seen that this is taken from 72,000 nests. As 

 at least three fourths of the quantity comes from Greenland, and as the Greenlanders seldom 

 allow the eggs to remain in the nest, even when half-hatched, and kill the Eider at all seasons 

 and under all circumstances, it is inexplicable that the decrease in the number of these birds is 

 not very considerably greater than it is. 



" In Sweden and Norway the flesh of the Eider is looked on as coarse, fishy, and nearly 

 uneatable. All the birds killed by us, nevertheless, went into the 'pot,' and were far from 

 unpalatable, to poor people like ourselves at least, who had not always the opportunity of a 

 good dinner." 



Mr. Selby describes the breeding-habits as follows : — 



"The nest is composed of fine sea-weed; and, as incubation proceeds, a lining of down, 

 plucked by the bird from her own body, is added ; this increases from day to day, and at last 

 becomes so considerable in quantity as to envelope and entirely conceal the eggs from view, no 

 doubt contributing, by its effect as a non-conductor of heat, to the perfect evolution of the foetus. 



" The young, as soon as hatched, are conducted to the water ; and this, in some instances, 

 must be effected by the parent carrying them in her bill, as I have frequently seen the nest 

 placed in such situations as to preclude the possibility of its being done in any other way. 

 Incubation lasts a month. The food of the Eider consists of the young of the different muscles 

 that cover the rocks, and other species of bivalves. The young are reared with difficulty in 

 confinement, and, being very bad walkers, are subject to frequent accidents in the poultry-yard. 

 Like all the Anatidce, possessing a lobated hind toe, they dive with facility, and remain sub- 

 merged for a long time." 



The following interesting account of this species is given by Mr. Hewitson in his well-known 

 work on British Birds' eggs : — 



" The males of this species, which spread themselves over the water in the neighbourhood in 

 which the females are engaged in incubation, are a beautiful and highly interesting ornament of 

 the northern seas. The Coquet, a small island at the mouth of the river of the same name, and 

 near the Hermitage of Walkworth, is their southern boundary during the breeding-season ; there 

 they lay their eggs and hatch their young ones, close under the walls and upon the low roof of 

 an inhabited house, where they remain quietly seated upon their nests as undisturbed by your 

 approach as the ducks and chickens of our domestic poultry, and will scarcely be driven from 

 thence ; so completely is their roving, wild nature tamed and subdued at this season of the year 

 by an uncontrollable and wonderful impulse. On the Fern Islands, twenty miles further to the 

 north, they are more numerous ; and although you may meet with an odd one here and there 

 over the several islands, the bulk of them seem partial to one in particular, where are the 

 remains of an old lighthouse, around the walls of which we found about a dozen of their nests. 

 Some had even established themselves within, under the roof of the deserted rooms, where they 

 were well protected from the bleak winds and rough weather by which those exposed spots are 

 visited. Holy Island (or St. Cuthbert's Isle, as it is sometimes called), upon which there stands 

 the beautiful Old Abbey of Lindisfarne, where dwelt in days of yore the good St. Cuthbert, is 



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