70 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



the first of the Kvalo lakes ; another pair had two young on the 

 sedgy pool where the Eed-necked Phalaropes were breeding. 



Phalacrocorax carbo. — Cormorants were seen on July 23rd on 

 the rocks and skerries off Svolvaer. 



Anser cinereus. — We did not actually meet with Grey-lag 

 Geese, but, to judge from their droppings, they frequent the 

 boggy margins of the forest pools on Tromso Island. The 

 pinioned Grey-lags in the courtyard of the Grand Hotel at 

 Tromso are said to have come from Karlso. 



Anas boscas. — One seen at a pool on Skjervo, another at the 

 Kvalo lakes. A duckling which we caught on the 19th close to 

 the water-lily pool above mentioned was probably of this species. 



Somateria mollissima. — Eiders were common about Tromso 

 and the neighbouring islands, but we saw only ducks with their 

 young broods ; the drakes appear to prefer more open water. On 

 July 14th there were many off Grindo. One party numbered five 

 old birds and about twenty young ; another duck had five, and 

 yet another four under her charge. On the rocky point at the 

 northern end of the island we found two young in the down 

 washed up ; they may have been killed by the big Gulls. A 

 maternal Eider grumbled " og og " as a Great Black-back settled 

 beside her brood. There was a nest in a hollow amongst the 

 rocks with the down still in it ; others amongst the rocky knolls, 

 or just within the birch wood, had been cleared out, and were 

 now mere hollows. A boy showed us a nest by the shore ; the 

 bird was sitting in a little stone shelter, from which she bustled 

 clumsily out. There were only two eggs ; one taken was on the 

 point of hatching. On the morning of the 17th, as we walked to 

 a rocky point near Lyngseidet, many Eiders swam out from the 

 shore with their broods. It was very common to see two old 

 ducks with five young ones between them : very many had none. 

 Next day, at Skjervo, I noted two old birds followed by fifteen 

 young ones, no doubt the produce of a couple of nests which had 

 not been discovered ; we found one such still full of down on the 

 less frequented side of the island. At Svolvaer semi-domesticated 

 Eiders swam in the harbour amongst the boats, close under the 

 hotel windows. When returning in the ' Sirius,' we lay to for 

 some time at Kobberdal, on the island of Lokta, to take on board 

 three hundred barrels of herrings. Close to us was a small islet 



