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annoying and intrusive as the mosquitoes, which are there as troublesome as in any country I have 

 been in." It is said to occur in Senegal, and is recorded from Damara Land by Mr. Andersson, 

 who remarks that he only observed it on the sea-coast, chiefly at or near Walvich Bay, and there 

 it is by no means numerous. It breeds in South Africa; and, referring to its presence in the 

 Cape colony, Mr. Layard writes (B. of S. Afr. p. 373), " the Crested Grebe is common on all 

 our vleys. It breeds in companies, six or eight nests generally appearing within a few yards of 

 each other ; these are built on the water — a mere flat form of sedge, generally damp throughout ; 

 indeed 1 remarked that every egg taken by us at Zoetendals Vley was wet. This might have 

 been caused, however, by the wet water-weed with which each bird carefully covered her eggs as 

 we approached the nest. I watched three birds perform this manoeuvre through my binocular. 

 They slid off their nests and rapidly picked up the floating weed, which they carefully disposed 

 over the eggs so as completely to hide them from view. We examined some fifteen or twenty 

 nests, each one of which was thus covered. We never found more than three eggs in each nest. 

 The bird feeds on small fish and water-insects." Mr. Ayres has only once met with it in the 

 Transvaal, where one was caught in shallow water by a Caffre. 



In Asia the Great Crested Grebe is found as far east as Japan. It is recorded by several 

 authors from the Caspian. Mr. Blanford saw a pair at Bampur in April, and says that it is 

 common everywhere on the Baluchistan coast. Mr. A. O. Hume states (Stray Feathers, i. p. 265), 

 " this species is very rare inland in Sindh. I only saw it once, and then on the Muncher 

 lake; but in the sea outside the Kurrachee harbour and, as I ascertained, along the coast to 

 Kutch, especially about the mouth of the Indus, and again all the way up the Mekran coast, 

 and notably in both the Gwader bays, it is excessively abundant, though not easy to procure, 

 and the specimens I shot cost me many hours' delightful but still hard work." According to 

 Dr. Jerdon it has occasionally been killed in the Sunderbunds and brought to Calcutta ; and 

 Captain Butler writes (Stray Feathers, iv. p. 31) : — " I obtained a specimen of the Crested Grebe 

 in a large tank a few miles off the road from Deesa to Ahmedabad. I have received specimens 

 of this from Kutch, and obtained it in Sindh and also on the western coast of Kattiawar, at 

 Beyt, and again in the lagoon at Poorbunder. I have no record of its occurrence in Jodhpoor 

 or Bajpootana generally ; and it has not occurred as yet in the neighbourhood of the Sambhur 

 Lake." Mr. Andrew Anderson says, on the authority of Mr. Nicholson, that it breeds in the 

 plains of India ; and Mr. J. Scully, who met with it in Eastern Turkestan, says " it was numerous 

 in the lakes of Sughuchak, about twelve miles west of Yarkand, in summer, where it was 

 breeding. The birds were so difficult to approach, however, that I only managed to shoot two ; 

 and one of those I lost in the thick reeds and rushes into which it fell. The bird was never 

 seen in winter." I do not find it recorded from Siberia ; but, according to Colonel Przevalsky 

 (in Bowl. Orn. Misc.), a single bird was seen, on passage, in April, near the lower Dolon-nor, in 

 Mongolia, and several were noticed on Lake Urgan-nor, in the Hoang-ho valley. It arrives at 

 Lake Hanka late in March, and breeds in small numbers on out-of-the-way ponds. Pere David 

 did not meet with it in the interior of China ; but Swinhoe states that it appears in large 

 numbers on the southern coast. It does not appear to be common in Japan ; for Mr. Whitely 

 only obtained two, one in November 1864 and the other in December 1854, both at Hakodadi. 



Its range southward is extensive ; for it is found both in Australia and New Zealand. 



