80 
FRANK FORESTER^ FIELD SPORTS. 
them, and so successful were they, that, as Mr. Beasly informs me, 
two hundred and forty were killed in one day, and sold among 
the neighbors at twelve-and-a-half cents a-piece, without the 
feathers. The wounded ones were generally abandoned as be¬ 
ing too difficult to be come up with. They continued about for 
three weeks, and during a greater part of that time, a continual 
cannonading was heard from every quarter. The gunners called 
them Sea Ducks. They were all Canvass-backs, at that time on 
their way to the North, when this floating feast attracted their 
attention, and for a while arrested them in their course. A pair 
of these very ducks I myself bought in the Philadelphia market 
at the time, from an Egg Harbor gunner, and never met with 
their superior either in weight or excellence of flesh. When it 
was known among these people the loss they had sustained, in 
selling for twenty-five cents what would have brought them from 
a dollar to a dollar and a half per pair, universal surprise and 
regret were naturally enough excited.”— Wilson’s American Or¬ 
nithology. 
RED-HEADED DUCK. 
Red-headed Duck , Anas Ferina ; Wils. Fuligula Ferina ; Sw. 8f 
Rich. Red-headed Duck , or Fochard; Nuttall. Red-headed 
Duck, Fuligula Ferina ; Audubon. 
“ Specific Character. —Bill bluish, toward the end black, and 
about two inches and a quarter long; irides yellowish-red. 
Adult male with the head, which is rather large, and the upper 
part of the neck all round, dark reddish-chestnut, brightest on 
the hind neck ; lower part of the neck, extending on the back 
and upper part of the breast, black; abdomen white, darker 
toward the vent, where it is barred with undulating lines of 
dusky ; flanks gray, closely barred with black, scapulars the 
same ; primaries brownish-gray, secondaries lighter; back 
grayish-brown, barred with fine lines of white ; rump and upper 
tail-coverts blackish-brown; tail feathers grayish-brown, lighter 
