2 The Natural History of British Ducks 
He is, too, one of the most cosmopolitan of birds. Wherever marsh and 
waterways are to be found, there is he with his sombre-clad wife. In summer 
he wends his way north as far as the Arctic wastes, and in winter some stay 
on even in such high latitudes as the non-freezing rivers of Kamtschatka, while 
in Central Africa he ranges as far south as Lake Chad, and in India as far 
as the Nerbudda, though in tropical India he is rarely to be found. As soon 
as the Pamir Lakes on ' the Roof of the World ' commence to thaw, the Mallard 
are there in thousands. They are also met with in great numbers throughout 
North America and Canada, and are generally distributed at different seasons 
through Central America, the West Indies, the Azores, Algeria, Egypt, Persia, 
India, China and Japan. In Europe they are found everywhere from the north 
of Norway to the Mediterranean, being especially numerous in winter off the 
coasts of Holland and in Albania. 
Although forced to become a migratory bird, owing to the freezing of the 
northern waters of its palsearctic home, the Mallard may still be found 
throughout its summer range even so far north as Iceland, Kamtschatka and 
Siberia, provided there be some open waters where food may be obtained. In 
winter, too, it may be met with in many parts of the northern Rockies of 
Western America, where the temperature falls to thirty or even forty degrees 
below zero ; living there in warm springs or along the margins of swift streams 
where the current is too rapid to allow the waters to freeze. Thus we see 
that, apart from the question of food supplies, which are apt to be cut off by 
the freezing of water, mere winter cold has little to do with the periodical 
migration. Like the true sea-ducks, the birds can stand almost any degree of 
frost, and apparently enjoy it, so long as the door of their larder remains open 
and there is food enough to satisfy their wants. 
In the Central Eastern States of America the Mallard is not a very 
common bird, but in the Southern States, the Western interior and California 
the species is abundant. 
Formerly Mallard used to breed in considerable numbers in Illinois, Indiana, 
Wisconsin, and Michigan, but now most of the birds proceed further northwards, 
