KING DUCK. 
417 
NATATORES. 
ANA TIDJE. 
KING DUCK. 
SOMATERIA SPECTABILIS. 
PLATE CXV. FIGS. I. AND II. 
The King Duck has acquired a place in the list of our 
British Birds, by having two or three times appeared upon 
our coast. It is abundant in Spitzbergen; and Iiolbcell 
expresses his surprise that it is so very seldom seen in 
Iceland, whilst in Greenland it is spread over the whole 
country, although its proper breeding zone lies further 
north than that part of the country inhabited by Euro¬ 
peans. It is found breeding, though very rarely, in the 
sixty-seventli degree of latitude, but is not numerous 
south of seventy-three degrees. In its habits it very 
much resembles the common eider. It migrates in the 
same direction, but begins later in autumn to move to¬ 
wards the south. Its spring migration also begins later, 
although it has to go a greater distance northwards, pro¬ 
bably because the sea is not earlier open. The young 
birds occasionally become victims to their unwillingness 
to move south, by remaining till the sea is everywhere 
ice-bound. In its powers of diving, this species far sur¬ 
passes all the other Greenland birds, it also remains the 
longest time under water. It uses its wings in diving, 
and descends to the depth of two hundred yards, remain- 
ino* as much as nine minutes under water. These remarks 
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