. An illustrated manual of British birds . eeds occasionally, though not veryfreely ; and has been known to cross with the Pintail, Mallard, andTeal. The adult male has the forehead and crown cream-white; cheeksand hind neck chestnut, minutely spotted with bottle-green; chinblack ; throat and upper neck chestnut; breast white, passing intogrey on the under parts, the flanks being pencilled with darkgrey ; mantle chiefly of a finely vermiculated grey ; shoulder whitewith a terrninal bar of black, followed hyz green speculum tippedwith black below; quills and tail dark brown; bill bluish-leadcol
. An illustrated manual of British birds . eeds occasionally, though not veryfreely ; and has been known to cross with the Pintail, Mallard, andTeal. The adult male has the forehead and crown cream-white; cheeksand hind neck chestnut, minutely spotted with bottle-green; chinblack ; throat and upper neck chestnut; breast white, passing intogrey on the under parts, the flanks being pencilled with darkgrey ; mantle chiefly of a finely vermiculated grey ; shoulder whitewith a terrninal bar of black, followed hyz green speculum tippedwith black below; quills and tail dark brown; bill bluish-leadcolour ; legs and toes dark brown. Early in July plumageis assumed, but the tints of the drake are always the brighter. Length18 in.; wing io5 in. The female is generally mottled with greyish-brown on the upper parts, and the shoulders are nearly white; thespeculum is greyish-green, and the under parts are mottled bufiish-white. As usual, the young resemble the female, which occasionallyassumes nearly full male plumage. 427. THE AMERICAN WIGEON. Mareca AMERICANA (J. F. (imelin). The occurrence of this bird in a London market during thewinter of 1837-8 was thus noticed by Blyth, in the third volume ofN. Woods Naturalist, p. 417 :—The American Wigeon is anovelty which was obtained by Mr. Bartlett. He selected it froma row of Common Wigeons, deeming it, at the time, to be only anaccidental variety of the species ; there was a female along with it,which, after some hesitation, he unfortunately left, considering itonly as a variety, but insufficiently diverse to be worth preserving ;he has since, however, positively recognized the female of theAmerican Wigeon to be identical with the bird he thus passed overhesitatingly in the market. This specimen—a male—is now in thecollection of Mr. J. H. Gurney ; and assuming, as we may fairly do,that it was really killed in this country, it is the only British-takenexample in existence. Thompson believed on hearsay evidence
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