WINGS AND FEET 
below like the fin of a great fish, and I have 
seen a surf scoter near at hand fly under water. 
It is a curious thing, when one stops to think 
of it, that some species of ducks like those 
named above should vigorously fly under 
water, while other ducks should keep their 
wings close to their sides and shoot about 
under water by the action of their feet alone, 
yet this seems to be the case. The redhead and 
the canvasback, the scaups, the whistler or 
golden-eye and the bufflehead all seem to dis- 
regard their wings under water and use the 
feet alone. This is also true of the mergansers, 
who always dive with the wings pressed closely 
to the sides. Edmund Selous, who has watched 
water birds from vantage points on the cliffs 
of the Shetland Islands, says: ‘‘ The merganser 
dives like the shag or cormorant — though the 
curved leap is a little less vigorous — and swims 
like them, without using the wings. His food 
being fish, he usually swims horizontally, 
sometimes only just beneath the surface, and, 
as he comes right into the shallow inlets, where 
the water almost laps the shore, he can often 
be watched thus gliding in rapid pursuit.” * 
? Bird Watching, London, Igot, p. 153. 
193 
