8 
COLYMBID.E, 
remain constant to each other for life, and are also much 
attached to their breeding ground, to which they return. 
Both the male and female work at the construction of the 
nest. The nest itself is constructed on the surface of the 
water, and only sufficiently attached to some reed or flag 
that the stream or wind may not make it change its 
place : the materials of which the nest is composed, are 
roots and stalks, as well as the leaves of flags, and other 
aquatic plants, that are heaped one upon another to the 
height of six or seven inches, and double that in width; 
the eggs are from three to four in a nest, and resemble 
in size, shape, and colour, that represented in our plate. 
The young birds chirp and swim about as soon as they 
are hatched. 
The Great Crested Grebe measures twenty-one inches, the 
beak from the forehead two inches. 
The adult male bird in spring plumage has the crown of 
the head, the crest, and the ruff round the neck, of a glossy 
black, shading over into reddish yellow on the sides of the 
head ; the front part of the neck, and all the under parts 
are silvery white ; a streak above the eye; cheeks and throat 
white; the hinder part of the neck, back, scapulars, and 
wing coverts, are dusky brown ; the secondaries being white, 
form a bar across the wing ; a naked space between the eye 
and beak red ; the top ridge of the beak is dusky, the base 
reddish, and the tip white-horn colour; the legs are dusky on 
the outside, and cream-coloured inside ; the eyes are bright 
red. 
The bird of two years old has not yet come to its perfect 
state, and its crest is consequently small, and edged with 
white; the red about the face is wanting, and a dusky 
streak runs before and below the eye. 
The bird under two years of age has no crest, its forehead 
