EIDER. 
5 
again 
leaving the whole hocly naked, after which they betake themselves to the sea, and are never see 
till the next spring. What is also singular in them, their feathers have no quill, hut a fine lig it 
without any hard point, and soft as wool, covers the ivliole body. It has a tuft on its head resem » 
that of a Peacock, and a train larger than that of a house-cock. I he hen has not such ornament 
beauty.” 
A few words with reference to the several stages of this species figured in the Plates, together with t e 
localities in which they were procured, may not be out of place. 
Plate I. A female and brood (probably about three weeks old), obtained between the islands of Eidra and 
Ebris, in the Eirth of E'orth, during the second week in June 18G7. 
Plate II. Male and female in plumage of first autumn : the former shot in the Channel off Lancing, in 
Sussex, early in October 1882 ; the latter in Gullane Bay, in the Eirth of Eorth, on the 16th of September, 
1874. 
Plate III. Adult male, obtained near the island of Eidra in May 1867, and a male showing one of the 
intermediate stages of plumage, killed near the same spot in September 1874. 
