76 BIRDS OF P. E. ISLAND.

The Black Duck (Al/(IS o/u‘mm) is sometimes with us all winter too, but it is a bird of the sheltered river, not of the foaming Gulf. In summer, it disports on the broad estuary, Chas- ing its fellows through the splashing water, and shouting loud quacks in its glee. It wanders in companies of a score or more when out on the bay, but disperses in very small numbers when it goes up to the marshes to feed. At dusk, I have seen large numbers going out to lonely places at sea, for security over night. The female hides her nest in the hrushwood, near the shores, or in long grass on the sand hills, and deposits her seven to thirteen greenish eggs in a bulky, comfortable receptacle, built of dry grass, with some down. She lays in june or july, and in August, has her brood around her out on the river. So Close do the ducklings keep to the mother, that, from a distance, you would take the whole group for one object. Most wary is the mother now as she floats the broad, silvery tide, or steals furtively to the covert on the bank. In winter a few of these ducks stay about the head-waters of rivers

and large springs. They do not (live for food,