386 FEATHERED GAME 
their stay a full-plumaged male is a rarity. 
The male goes on ahead to prepare the summer 
residence for his lady? Not exactly! When 
the house-keeping cares show on the family 
horizon, a cloud no larger than a man’s hand, 
Mr. Eider joins with other worthless good-for- 
naughts to spend his days and nights away from 
home, living almost entirely at sea until the 
nesting and moulting seasons are over and his 
offspring have become self-supporting. 
These are the largest of our ducks, eminently 
fitted to take care of themselves, and one of the 
few species which seem to be holding their own 
in the struggle against the destroyer. 
The difference between the American and the 
Old World type, represented by the Greenland 
Eider, which is occasionally taken on our coast, 
and is perhaps a more northern race than our 
own, lies principally in the shape of the frontal 
process and bill; these, in the American bird, 
are heavier and the tips of the nose ornaments 
are rounder and fuller than in the European 
species. One must be a close observer, how- 
ever, to note the difference and distinguish the 
visitor among a number of our own birds. 
