4 AMERICAN GAME. 
pale gray, delicately crossed and pencilled with number- 
less narrow, waved, dusky lines, which on the sides and 
long feathers. that cover the thighs are more strongly 
and distinctly marked. The upper and under tail 
coverts, lower part of the back and rump, are black, the 
latter glossed with green; the four middle tail feathers 
are also black, with purple reflections, and, like those of 
the domestic duck, aré stiffly curled upward. The rest 
are sharp-pointed, and fade off to the exterior edges 
from brown to dull white. “Iris of the eye bright 
yellow,. feet, legs and webs reddish orange, claws 
black. 
The female, and young male until after the first moult, 
are very different in plumage from the adult drake, par- 
taking none of its beauties, with the exception of the 
spot on the wings. All the other parts are plain brown, 
marked with black, the centre of every feather being 
dark and fading to the edges. She makes her nest, lays 
her eggs—from ten to sixteen in number, of a greenish 
white—generally in the most sequestered mosses or bogs, 
far from the haunts of man, and hidden from his sight 
among reeds and rushes. To her young, helpless, un- 
fledged family, and they are nearly three months before 
they can fly, she is a fond, attentive and watchful parent, 
carrying or leading them from one pool to another, as 
her fears or inclinations direct her, and she is known to 
use the same wily stratagems, in order to mislead the 
sportsman and his dog, as those resorted to by the ruffed 
