324 BRITISH BIRDS. 
SCOTER. 
BLACK DUCK, OR BLACK DIVER. 
(^Anas Nigra, Lin . — La Macreufe, BufF.) 
The Scoter is lefs than the Velvet Duck, weigh- 
ing generally about two pounds nine ounces, and 
meafuring twenty-two inches in length, and thirty- 
four in breadth. The bafe of the upper mandible 
is raifed up into a kind of large knob, divided down- 
wards in the middle by a narrow bright or deep 
yellow ftripe, which is fpread round the projeding 
edges of the noftrils, and extended nearly to the 
tip : the reft of the bill is black, grooved along near 
the edges, where it is broad and flat : the under 
mandible is alfo black: irides dufky. From the 
curious conformation and appearance of the billj 
