their nests. More generally, however, neither birds nor eggs are taken the least care of. Notwithstanding

that their flesh is not by any means palatable, these Ducks are continually persecuted and slaughtered, and the consequence is, that in Spitzbergen and other localities where the sale of the Eider-down used to be reckoned by the hundredweight, it is now reckoned only by pounds. Malmgren assures us that it is a rare thing to see young birds in the autumn; and the bird-catchers are loud in their complaints of a scarcity, for which they have only their own improvidence to blame. In Greenland the diminution, although not quite so conspicuous, is still very great, not more than a thousand pounds being now collected there annually. "Formerly," says Holboell, "the gross quantity of down procured in South Greenland in the course of a year was 5,007 lbs., and North Greenland produced about half that quantity. According to the usual reckoning a dozen nests yield a pound weight of the raw material, so that every year 104,520 birds were not only despoiled of their down but also robbed of their eggs.

THE TRUE EIDER DUCK, OR ST. CUTHBERT'S DUCK.

The True Eider Duck, or St. Cuthbert's Duck (Somateria mollissima), has the cheeks, chin, back, and breast white, the latter with a reddish tinge. Front and sides of the head black; nape, to the throat, pea-green; quills and tail brown, marked on the wings with velvet-black. The eye is reddish brown, the beak greenish yellow, the foot olive-green. The length of this bird is twenty-four inches, the breadth forty; the length of wing eleven inches, and length of tail three inches and a half. The female is smaller than the male, and her plumage rust-red, marked on the head and neck with longitudinal brown streaks, elsewhere with crescent-shaped black spots; her under side with deep brown, slightly lined with black. After the breeding season the plumage of the male loses much of its beautiful glistening appearance, both head and neck become blackish grey, more darkly clouded, the shoulders greyish black, and the region of the crop yellowish white, marked with black and rust-brown upon the borders of the individual feathers. It seems probable that this change of plumage is not produced by moulting, but by a gradual change in the colour of the feathers.

This valuable Duck is met with throughout the northern regions of the globe, its range extending from Jutland to Spitzbergen, and from the west coast of Europe along its northern shores to Greenland and Iceland. It is a constant resident in some of the northern parts of England and Scotland, and has the name of St. Cuthbert's Duck from the numbers that nest in that island. Its most southern breeding-places are upon the Island of Sylt and other small Danish islands in the same latitude, and from thence north it is met with in continually increasing numbers. In Iceland, Greenland, and Norway, it is very abundant, and is preserved with the utmost strictness. Their nests along the coast of Norway, we are told, produce, from the down they yield, on an average, a profit of five pounds a-piece in the year; so that a small barren rock, frequented by these birds, becomes a very valuable property, and has often been the subject of litigation between Norwegian landholders. Some years ago the Eider Fowl were killed in such numbers that their extinction in that country seemed imminent, but in 1847 the Norwegian Parliament passed a law for their relief, and since that time their pursuers have been obliged to confine themselves to robbing the nests; the consequence is that these Ducks are now very plentiful, and from the perfect security in which they live have attained a degree of impudent assurance unsurpassed by the London Sparrows, or their own distant connections on the ornamental waters in our parks. In the town of Tromsöe they come to the house doors to be fed, and walk about as if strongly impressed with the consciousness of their own importance. In the northern parts of Great Britain these birds are seen assembling in groups along the shores of the mainland about April, from whence they cross to the adjacent islands early in May. The nest of this