THE WILD DUCK. 
75 
William Jardine has, however, generally seen one or two speci- 
mens (though where obtained is not stated) during the winter and 
spring in Edinburgh market, and according to the f Historia Na- 
turalis Orcadensis' (p. 75), published in 1848, the species is not 
unfrequent in Orkney. 
THE WILD DUCK. 
Mallard. 
Anas loschas, Linn. 
Is common around the coast ; on fresh-water lakes, &c. ; 
and is indigenous. 
Although great numbers of these birds migrate from more 
northern countries to our coasts and inland waters every winter, 
the species breeds throughout the island wherever it can find 
suitable localities. At a sheet of water, about two miles from 
Belfast, in Belvoir Park, two or three pair annually build, and a 
similar number at Ballydrain Lake, four miles distant : in 1832, 
the young were noted as swimming about here at the beginning 
of May. Numbers breed about two lakes at Hillsborough 
Park, at the distance of ten miles. A person visiting them on the 
10th of June, 1845, saw about a dozen broods of young, the fe- 
male parents of which exhibited various stratagems to induce 
him and the gamekeeper to follow her instead of the duck- 
lings ; if on the ground, dragging herself along it apparently by 
the aid of her wings alone ; if at the edge of the water, rushing 
along the surface flapping her wings ; the bill in either case being 
wide agape, and a loud cry kept up. The young, in the mean- 
time, became secreted among the herbage or escaped into the water; 
once into which, they instantly dived, and continued doing so until 
they got so far out as to be inapprehensive of danger, when they 
formed a little flock and swam quite composedly after their parent. 
The keeper here believes that pike, of which there are many in 
one lake, consume a number of the young birds, as he has often 
