RARER BRITISH BIRDS, 81 
SURF DUCK. 
Oidemia Perspicillata. Linnaeus. 
Few are the specimens of this bird which have been obtained 
on the British coasts ; it has, however, been occasionally found 
in the Orkney and Shetland Isles. 
The Surf Duck is one of those North American and Arctic 
species which we now and then find driven, probably by stress 
of weather, from their true line of migration. Wilson, the 
American ornithologist, says, that they are altogether confined 
to the shores and bays of the sea, particularly where the waves 
roll over the sandy beach. Their food consists chiefly of small 
bivalve shells, spout fish, and others, that lie in the sand near 
the surface, for which they dive constantly, both in the sandy 
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