KING EIDER. 



535 



breeding plumage at Licking Reservoir the following April. Both are 

 now in my collection. Mr. H. E. Chubb informs me of its capture in 

 Medina county, in the winter of 1880-1, and writes under date of Feb- 

 ruary 7, 1881 : 



" Since receiving your letter, a male was bronght in alive, having been captured in a 

 creek near this city [Cleveland]. A Buffalo friend tells me that they are very abundant 

 on the Niagara Eiver at times, and only yesterday a Canadian from the North shore of 

 lower Lake Ontario told me of their being with them in immense numbers. They are 

 frequently caught in the fisherman's nets, becoming entangled when diving for fish." 



Genus SOMATEEIA. Leach. 



Bill narrow, compressed, tapering to the end. Feathers of the forehead running for- 

 ward in a long narrow point, and of cheeks extending along the lower edge of bill, so 

 that the two strips embrace between them a linear portion of the bill, cue-half the length 

 of oulmen, and which extends back further than the lower edge of mandible. Nostrils 

 beyond the middle of commissure. Nail very broad, thickened, and greatly overlapping tip 

 of lower mandible. Tail short, rounded; about two-fifths the wing. 



Sub-genus Somatma. Bill with frontal processes, not feathered to the nostrils. 

 SoMATBRiA sPECTABiLis (L.) Leach. 



HCing Kider. 



Somateria spectaUUs, Whbaton, Ohio Agric. Rep. for 1860, 370, 378 ; Eeprint, 1861, 12, 

 20 ; Pood of Birds, etc., Ohio Agrio. Eep. for 1874, 574 ; Reprint, 1875, 14.— CouKS, 

 Birds N. W., 1874, 581.— Allen, Bull. Nntt. Orn. Club, v, 1880, 62. 



Anas apeeiaUlis, hitna^VB, Fn. Suec, 39. 

 Somateria spectaJnUs, Boib, Isis, 1822, 564. 



Bill with broad squarish, nearly vertical frontal processes bulging angularly out of line 

 with culmen. Male in breeding attire, black, including a forked chin-patch, a frontal 

 band, and small space round eye ; the neck and fore-parts of the body, part of inter- 

 scapulars, of wing-coverts and of lining of wings, and a flank patch, white, creamy on 

 the jngulnm, greenish on sides of head ; crown and nape fine blnish-ash. Female 

 resembling that of the Common Eider , but bill different. Size of the last or rather less. 



Habitat, northern North America and Europe. Chiefly coastwise. South to New 

 Jersey. In the interior to Lake Erie. 



HiSTRIONICUS TOBQUATUS (L.) Bp. 



H[arleq.Tiin Uixcli. 



SUtriomeus torgualms, Whbaton, Ohio Agric. Eep. for 1860 (1861), addenda, 480 ; Food 

 of Birds, etc., Ohio Agrio. Eep. for 1874, 574 ; Reprint, 1875, 14. 



This dnck was admitted to my lists of 1861 and 1875, on what I now deem insufficient 

 authority. It was then believed to be of rare occurrence on Lake Erie, but was not men- 

 tioned in Mr. Winslow's list of ducks of Northern Ohio. Several specimens are said to 

 have been taken by Dr. Hoy, of Bacine, Wisconsin, and Dr. Cones' has discovered it 

 breeding in Dakota. 



