THE GUN AT HOME AND ABROAD 
All ducks seen ashore, it may be relied on, are game -ducks, by which 
I mean surface -feeding ducks; the diving-ducks never go on to the ooze, 
but keep afloat in the creeks, pools, and tide -channels. 
Mallards and wigeon can be told from geese, with a good telescope, 
up to three miles, by their sitting horizontal and so much lower — ^far 
lower than geese, which stand high on their legs and are more erect. 
When resting ashore, many mallards are seen to be squatting on their 
breasts on the mud, with beaks tucked back beneath the wing -coverts. 
Geese never sit thus, nor are they ever seen asleep, or even in postures of 
repose. 
Wigeon, when ashore, also show very low and horizontal ; but they are 
visibly smaller, slimmer, and more nimble than mallards, whose heavy 
bills, thick sinuous necks, puffed out or curled around the breast, give 
them a portly appearance, albeit ever graceful. When afloat, a company of 
wigeon are recognized because they show dark on the water, whereas 
mallards display a mottled appearance in general colour owing to the 
pearly -grey backs of the drakes. 
On the wing, wigeon show far whiter beneath than any other of the 
game -ducks, while their wings (dark below and very rapidly beaten) 
have a fin -like appearance. No better idea can be conveyed than the pic- 
ture in Millais’ “ Fowler in Scotland,” p. 94. 
Pintails (though they idealize the duck -type), differ from all others 
in their long, slim build, and very long necks. By these characteristics 
alone they can be distinguished on the wing even in a bad light, when 
colours are invisible. But in normal daylight the snow-white breast and 
fore -neck of the drakes — ^when at rest disposed in a graceful S -shaped 
curve — present an infallible index. Excepting the exposed breast, the 
pintail, when afloat, shows no white above water-line.* 
Gadwall, rarely met with on British coasts, and always a fresh -water 
lover at best, cannot safely be distinguished on the wing from mallard 
beyond the distance at which the white speculum is visible. That — and its 
note also — are unmistakable distinctions within moderate range. 
The Shoveler needs no mention, nor do teal ; though it may be worth 
stating that the Garganey is at once recognizable from the latter by the 
very conspicuous white superciliary stripe — extending above and back- 
wards from the eye, and which is readily visible with the naked eye at 
*I refer to smooth water only. In a sea-way (so to speak) the pintails, of course, display glimpses of their white 
undersides. So, for example, does the great crested grebe, which, in still water, exhibits no white whatever on the 
body —whether in summer or winter dress. 
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