266 
GOOSANDER. 
others the Sheldrake, Fisherman, Diver, &c. is a winter inha- 
bitant only, of the seashores, fresh water lakes, and rivers of 
the United States. They usually associate in small parties of 
six or eight, and are almost continually diving in search of food. 
In the month of April they disappear, and return again early in 
November. Of their particular place and manner of breeding 
we have no account. Mr. Pennant observes that they continue 
the whole year in the Orkniesj and have been shot in the Fle- 
brides, or Western islands of Scotland in summer. They are 
also found in Iceland, and Greenland, and are said to breed 
there; some asserting that they build on trees; others that they 
make their nests among the rocks. 
The male of this species is twenty-six inches in length, and 
three feet three inches in extent, the bill three inches long, and 
nearly one inch thick at the base, serrated on both mandibles; 
tlie upper overhanging at the tip, where each is furnished with 
a large nail; the ridge of the bill is black, the sides crimson red; 
irides red; head crested, tumid, and of a black colour glossed 
with green, which extends nearly half way down the neck, the 
rest of which, with the breast and belly, are white tinged with 
a delicate yellowish cream; back and adjoining scapulars black; 
primaries and shoulder of the wing brownish black; exterior 
part of the scapulars, lesser coverts, and tertials white; second- 
aries neatly edged with black, greater coverts white, their up- 
per halves black, forming a bar on the wing, rest of the upper 
parts and tail brownish ash; legs and feet the colour of red seal- 
ing wax; flanks marked with fine semicircular dotted lines of 
deep brown; the tail extends about three inches beyond the 
wings. 
This description was taken from a full plumaged male. The 
young males, which are generally much more numerous than 
the old ones, so exactly resemble the females in their plumage 
for at least the first, and part of the second year, as scarcely to 
be distinguished from them; and what is somewhat singular, 
the crests of these and of the females are actually longer than 
those of the full grown male, though thinner towards its extre- 
