180 
THE WIGEON. 
to say something on certain parts of their economy, 
which our ornithological writers seem never to have 
noticed. 
The wigeon is a much more familiar bird than 
either the pochard or the teal. While these con- 
gregate on the water, beyond the reach of man, the 
wigeon appears to have divested itself of the timidity 
observable in all other species of wild fowl, and ap- 
proaches very near to our habitations. A consider- 
able time elapsed before I was enabled to account 
satisfactorily for the wigeon's remaining here during 
the night ; a circumstance directly at variance with 
the habits of its congeners, which, to a bird, pass 
the night away from the place where they have been 
staying during the day. But, upon paying a much 
closer attention to it than I had formerly been ac- 
customed to do, I observed that it differed from them 
ail, both in the nature of its food, and in the time of 
procuring it. The mallard, the pochard, and the teal 
obtain nearly the whole of their nourishment during 
the night. On the contrary, the wigeon procures its 
food in the daytime, and that food is grass. He 
who has an opportunity of watching the wigeon 
when it is undisturbed, and allowed to follow the 
bent of its own inclinations, will find that, while the 
mallard, the pochard, and the teal are sporting on 
the water, or reposing on the bank at their ease, it is 
devouring with avidity that same kind of short grass, 
on which the goose is known to feed. Hence, though 
many flocks of wigeons accompany the other water- 
fowl in their nocturnal wanderings, still numbers of 
them pass the whole of the night here ; and this I 
