580 GUUSANDER 
tures of its bill. The genus is characterized as follows :— «Bill, 
toothed, s!ender, cylindrical, hooked at the point; nostrils, small, oval, 
placed in the middle of the bill; feet, four-toed, the outer toe longest.” 
Naturalists have denominated it Merganser. In this country, the birds 
composing this genus are generally known by the name of Fisherman, 
‘or Fisher Ducks. The whole number of known species amount to 
only nine or ten, dispersed through various quarters of the world; of 
these, four species, of which the present is the largest, are known to 
inhabit the United States. 
From the common habit of these birds in feeding almost entirely on 
fin and shell fish, their flesh is held in little estimation, being often 
lean and rancid, both smelling and tasting strongly of fish; but such 
are the various peculiarities of tastes, that persons are not wanting 
who pretend to consider them capital meat. 
The Goosander, called by some the Water Pheasant, and by others 
the Sheldrake, Fisherman, Diver, &c., is a winter inhabitant only of 
the sea-shores, fresh-water lakes, and rivers of the United States. 
They usually associate in small parties of six or eight, and are almost 
continually diving in search of food. In the month of April they dis- 
appear, and return again early in November. Of their particular place, 
and manner of breeding, we have no account. Mr. Pennant observes, 
that they continue the whole year in the Orkneys; and have been shot 
in the Hebrides, or Western Islands of Scotland, in summer. They 
are also found in Iceland and Greenland, and are said to breed there ; 
some asserting that they build on trees; others, that they make their 
nests among the rocks. 
The male of this species is twenty-six inches in length, and three 
feet three inches in extent; the bill, three inches long, and nearly one 
inch thick at the base, serrated on both mandibles; the upper over- 
hanging at the tip, where each is furnished with a large nail; the 
ridge of the bill is black; the sides, crimson red; irides, red; head, 
crested, tumid, and of a black color, glossed with green, which extends 
nearly half way down the neck, the rest of which, with the breast and 
belly, are white, tinged with a delicate yellowish cream; back, and 
adjoining scapulars, black; primaries, and shoulder of the wing, 
brownish black; exterior part of the scapulars, lesser coverts, and 
tertials, white ; secondaries, neatly edged with black; greater coverts, 
white ; their upper halves, black, forming a bar on the wing; rest of 
the upper parts, and tail, brownish ash; legs and feet, the color of red 
sealing-wax; flanks, marked with fine, semicircular, dotted lines of 
deep brown; the tail extends about three inches beyond the wings. 
This description was taken from a full-plumaged male. The young 
males, which are generally much more numerous than the old ones, 
so exactly resemble the females in their plumage for at least the first, 
and part of the second year, as scarcely to be distinguished from 
‘ 
generally only one, or, at most, two adult males—the others being in immature 
dress, or fers les ; thus the la‘ter is said to be the most common. ‘They fish about 
the bottoms >f the streams and pools, and, I believe, destroy many fish. I have 
taken seven trout, about four or five inches in length, from the stomach of a female. 
In Hudson’s Bay (according to Hearne) they are called Sheldrakes ; the name 
by which they are also distinguished by the common people in all the rivers in the 
south of Scotland. — Ep. 
