96 



FEMALE LONG-TAILED DUCK. 

 [Plate LXX.— Fig. 2.] 



^Mas hyemalis, Linjst. Syst. 202. 29 — Lath. Syn. Ill, p. 629. — Peai,e's Museum, JS^o. 3811. 



THE female is distinguished from the male by wanting the 

 lengthened tertials, and the two long pointed feathers of the tail, 

 and also by her size, and the rest of her plumage, which is as fol- 

 lows : length sixteen inches, extent twenty eight inches; bill dusky; 

 middle of the crown and spot on the side of the neck blackish ; a 

 narrow dusky line runs along the throat for two inches; rest of the 

 head and upper half of the neck white, lower half pale vinaceous 

 bay blended with white; all the rest of the lower parts of the body 

 pure white; back, scapulars, and lesser wing coverts bright ferru- 

 ginous, centered with black, and interspersed with whitish; shoul- 

 ders of tiie wing, and quills black ; lower part of the back the 

 same, tinged with brown ; tail pale brown ash, inner vanes of all 

 but the two middle feathers white; legs and feet dusky slate. The 

 legs are placed far behind, which circumstance points out the spe- 

 cies to be great divers. In some females the upper parts are less 

 ferruginous. 



Some writers suppose the singular voice, or call, of this spe- 

 cies, to be occasioned by the remarkable construction of its wind- 

 pipe; but the fact, that the females are uniformly the most noisy,, 

 and yet are entirely destitute of the singularities of this conforma- 

 tion, overthrows the probability of this supposition. 



