WILSON’S 
AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY. 
HOODED MERGANSER. (Mergus cucullatus.) 
PLATE LXIX.—Fie. 1. 
L’Harle Huppé de Virginie, Briss. vii. p. 258, 8.—Pl. enl. 935.—L’Harle Cou- 
ronné, Buff. viii. p. 280.—Round-crested Duck, Ldw. pl. 860.—Catesby. i. pl. 
94,—Arct. Zool. No. 467.—Lath. Syn. 10, p. 426.—Peale’s Museum, No. 2980. 
MERGUS CUCULLATUS.—LINNAUS. 
Mergus cucullatus, Cuv. Regn. Anim. i. p. 540.—Bonap. Synop. p. 397.—Selby, 
Lilust. Brit. Ornith. pl. 58. 
T'HIs species on the sea-coast is usually called the hairy-head. 
They are more common, however, along our lakes and fresh- 
water rivers than near the sea; tracing up creeks, and visit- 
ing millponds, diving perpetually for their food. In the 
creeks and rivers of the southern States they are very frequently 
seen during the winter. Like the red-breasted, they are migra- 
tory, the manners, food, and places of resort of both being very 
much alike. 
The hooded merganser is eighteen inches in length, and two 
feet in extent ; bill, blackish red, narrow, thickly toothed, and 
furnished with a projecting nail at the extremity ; the head is 
ornamented with a large circular crest, which the bird has 
the faculty of raising or depressing at pleasure ; the fore part 
of this, as far as the eye, is black, thence to the hind head, 
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