aj6 COO T. 



as the crown, and covered with a white (kin* : the head, neck, 

 and back, are black ; the laft inclining to aih-colour : the breaft, 

 belly, and vent, afh-colour : outer edge of the wing white: at 

 the beginning of the naked part above the knee a circle or garter 

 of yellow: the colour of the legs yellowifh green : toes furnifhed 

 on each fide with a fcalloped broad membrane. 

 No difference obferved between the fexes. 

 Place. The Coot is pretty common throughout England at all feafons ; 



fometimes met with many together in winter; but inbreeding- 

 time chiefly in pairs about the borders of ponds well covered 

 with weeds, rufhes, &c. and both fwims and dives well. It 

 makes a very large neft of weeds well matted together, lining it 

 within with grafs, &c. and lays as far as fourteen or fifteen eggs f, 

 two inches and a quarter long, of a pale brownifh white, regu- 

 larly peppered with chocolate-coloured fpots, fome of them very 

 minute, the biggeft only an eighth of an inch in fize, moft fpotted 

 at the largeft end : the young take to the water very foon after 

 hatching. This fpecies is not fo numerous as might be expected ; 

 for we find that vaft numbers fall a prey while young to the 

 Buzzards, which frequent the marfh.es. The food is fmall^^ 

 and water infeSls ; but will fometimes eat the roots of the bulrujh t 

 and with it feed the young ; is faid likewife to eat grain. 

 We believe this fpecies to extend throughout the old continent* 

 and perhaps the new alfo. Authors record it as inhabiting 

 Greenland, Sweden, Norway, Ruffia, Sibiria, Verfia, and China, 



* Brijfon fays red; but it is only fo in the feafon of incubation. I have never 

 yet feen it of a/«//red. 



t As far as eighteen or twenty, Eiji. ties Oif. — And further, that if the firft fen's 

 taken away, it will lay ten or twelve more for a fecond hatch. 



and 



