248 BIRD LIFE THROUGHOUT THE YEAR 



when frost drives it from the inland waters. The 

 Golden-eye is known by the whistling or rattling noise 

 made by its wings in flight, and often owes its life to its 

 quickness in diving, disappearing at the flash. As 

 with many of the diving ducks, it is chiefly the females 

 and young birds which come thus far south, so that the 

 obtaining of an old drake Merganser or Goosander 

 in full plumage is a rare event, — pity that the delicate 

 salmon-tint of the under-parts of the latter bird 

 so quickly fades. The Long-tailed Duck, whose loud 

 musical call is heard in summer amongst the northern 

 isles, appears every winter in varying numbers, and is 

 the " pintail " of the gunners upon the Yorkshire coast. 

 For memories of the finest sight of all, that of a flock 

 of Wild Swans upon the wing, trumpeting their bugle- 

 call in time to the beating of their great pinions, we 

 must go back for some years to a winter of Arctic 

 severity, when the ice-floes went grinding to-and-fro 

 in the estuary and lay piled up upon the shore. Further 

 still, but within the memory of the oldest sportsman, 

 stands out the Crimean winter, when there were all 

 sorts of unfamiliar birds about, and he counted two 

 hundred head of wild fowl one evening in the larder. 

 Round the winter fire while the curlew and redshanks 

 are calling outside in the darkness, further reminiscences 

 follow, — of that great shot at wigeon with the heavy 

 shoulder-gun which took half an ounce of powder, 

 and which resulted in eight and a half couple being 



