riED-Bn.T.ED GREBE. 
LITTLE GREBE. DABCIIICK. CAROLINA GREBE. 
PODILYMBUS PODICEPS. 
* 
Char. Upper parts dusky, wings varied with ashy and white ; under 
parts silvcrv white, mottled with dusky ; breast washed with rufous ; chm 
and throat lilack ; bill short and thick, of a bluish white color, with a black 
band across the centre. Length about 14 inches. 
Nest. Amid the rushes at the edge of a pond or sluggish stream, 
made of coarse herbage lined with grass ; sometimes floating on the water, 
fastened to reeds. 
4-10 (usually 5) ; white stained with pale brown ; 2.00 X 1.70- 
'I’he Pied-billed Dabchick is an exclusive inhabitant of the 
North American continent, proceeding north to breed as far 
as the remote fur countries of Upper Canada, a specimen hav- 
ing been killed on Great Slave Lake by the exploring party 
of Captain Franklin. It arrives in the Northern and Middle 
States about the close of August, and is then seen residing in 
our small freshwater lakes until the approach of winter, when 
it retires probably as far south as the lagoons of the Missis- 
sippi and the tidewater streams and bays of the Mexican 
Gulf. It is the most common species in the Union, and is 
met with in all the States as far as Florida, leaving those coun- 
