also, if there happen to he any growing near, the amount of 
material usually being increased as incubation proceeds. Now 
and then it happens that no attempt is made to line the nest 
until after the first few eggs have been deposited. I once 
found a nest — it was about five feet above the beach — among 
tangled masses of dead grass and coarse herbage. Sometimes, 
though rarely, the selected spot is beside a small hill loch in a 
sheltered depression, where the heather is long; but a very 
favourite situation is a hollow at the foot of a dry bank, where 
the long grass overhangs, and the tall flags grow close up. The 
number of eggs is from five to eight, but I have several times 
seen as many as ten. The rich reddish cream colour of the 
eggs is strongly tinged with green in some specimens, and 
these I have seen offered for sale as eggs of the Goosander. 
As early as the end of April the male begins to assume a 
state of plumage resembling that of the female, the change 
commencing with the growth of a number of new feathers and 
the shedding of the old ones at the base of the bill. When in 
full winter plumage he has the edges of the eyelids reddish 
brown, the eye crimson, becoming brownish towards the pupil ; 
the upper mandible of the bill dark reddish brown, the edges 
paler, and the tip also paler ; the under mandible vermilion 
tinged with orange ; inside of tarsus and toes bright orange- 
red, — the outsides of those parts tinged with purple, and 
dingier, and the webs dingier still ; claws light greyish brown. 
The eye and bill of the female are not so bright, and the 
tarsi and feet differ in being strongly tinged with dusky purplish 
brown. 
In the end of August one of five young birds which were 
accompanying the mother was shot and sent to me. The only 
feathers apparent among the down were those of the scapulars 
and tail, and a few upon the sides. The eye was yellowish 
grey ; the bill coloured similarly to that of an adult female : 
the tooth-like processes upon each edge of the upper mandible, 
about thirty in number, sharp and horny to the feel ; those 
upon the lower mandible smaller, more numerous, and scarcely 
