PINTAIL DUCK. 
403 
NA TA TORES. 
ANAT1DJF,. 
PINTAIL DUCK. 
Anas acuta. 
PLATJK CXIII. FIG. II. 
I AM very glad to have it in my power to correct ail 
error into which I have been led with regard to the eggs 
of the Pintail, and to figure one, which is verified beyond 
a doubt. Knowing the very great difficulty there is in 
identifying with certainty the closely approximating eggs 
of the Anatidce , I had taken pains to learn as much of 
the history of those I figured in the former edition of 
this work as was practicable; and, when Mr. Wolley 
sent me an egg from Lapland as that of the Pintail, 
greatly differing from the one which I had previously 
drawn, not willing without very good reason to give up 
my faith in the correctness of that figure, I wrote to 
Mr. Wolley for his evidence; and though it is rather long, 
it will be very satisfactory to those who have had the 
good fortune to acquire eggs of his taking, shewing as it 
does the extreme caution with which they are collected. 
“ A few years ago/' Mr. Wolley says, “I was very much 
surprised at the appearance of an egg given me by a gen¬ 
tleman (Mr. Henry Milner) who had brought it from Ice¬ 
land in 1846, and who assured me that it was out of a 
nest from which he had himself shot a female Pintail as it 
rose. It seemed so small for the bird, was so different 
