British Birds. 
To England Bewick’s Swan is a rarer migrant than the Whooper, but to 
Scotland and the Hebrides it is a much more frequent visitor, and it visits Ireland 
occasionally in very large numbers. Its breeding-home is in the tundra of Northern 
entirely of moss, and is a large structure, but is smaller than the nest of the Whooper. 
The eggs are two or three in number, white like those of its larger ally, but smaller 
and less glossy, measuring about four inches in length. 
The trachea in this species is simple and does not enter the 
lores, base of the upper-mandible, and the nostrils ; there is also a black swollen 
tubercle on the base of the bill, smaller in the female than in the male. The 
nestlings are of a dull ashy-grey, and the young birds are sooty-grey. The so- 
called Polish Swan ( Cygnus immutabilis) is now considered to be merely an albino 
when the birds are adult, no difference can be detected between them and the 
ordinary Mute Swan, though C. immutabilis has been said to have the legs and feet 
ashy grey. In Great Britain the present species is principally known as a domes- 
ticated bird, but occasionally examples appear to visit us from the Continent, where 
the Mute Swan is still met with in a wild state. It nests in South Sweden and 
Central Europe generally, as well as in Southern Russia, as far east as Turkestan. 
The food of the Mute Swan consists of water-weeds and other aquatic plants, 
together with small molluscs and water insects. The nest is a huge structure of 
dead flags and grass, and the eggs, from three to five or six in number, are greenish 
white ; their length is about four-and-a-half inches. 
being shed, so that the bird is not able to fly. The brilliant plumage of the breeding- 
season is discarded, and the male puts on a sober-coloured dress like that of the 
female, and hides himself away in reed-beds and quiet places, until his wings 
have grown again. Sea-Ducks, like the Eiders, betake themselves to the open sea, 
where the males collect in large flocks until the moult is completed. 
Besides the species enumerated below, there are several which have obtained a 
place in the British List, such as the Egyptian Goose ( Chenalopex agyptiaca), the 
Summer Duck (/Ex sponsa), and the Muscovy Duck ( Cairina moschata). These, 
however, are all species which are frequently kept in captivity, and the records of 
their capture are doubtless those of escaped birds. 
Russia and Siberia and it also nests on the island of Kolguev. The nest is made 
THE 
MUTE SWAN. 
(Cygnus olor.) 
keel of the sternum, as in the two preceding species. The adult 
bird is white all over, but the bill is of a reddish-orange colour, 
with a black tip ; the lower mandible is also black as well as the 
variety of the Mute Swan, due to captivity. This form has white nestlings, but 
THE 
TRUE DUCKS. 
AN AT IN M. 
Sub-family 
All the typical Ducks have a narrow lobe on the hind toe, and 
there is a metallic speculum of bright colour on the wings, by 
which most of the species are recognised. The males have a 
bony swelling on the trachea. Several species, if not every 
Duck, moults after the nesting-season is over, the quills even 
