Wigeon. Mr. Bond has a fine example in the male plumage
resulting from this unusual cross.
In the adult male Teal the beak is nearly black ; the
irides hazel; forehead, and a narrow hand over the top of
the head, rich chestnut-brown ; at the gape and upwards,
along the base of the upper mandible, and from thence high
up over the eye, and then backwards towards the occiput,
there is a narrow line of huff; from the lower edge of the
eye to a point below and behind the ear-coverts, another
narrow line of the same light colour ; all the space from the
eye between these two lines, and extending backward to the
occiput, forms a broad patch of rich glossy green ; cheeks
and sides of the neck, below the under light-coloured line,
rich chestnut; hack of the neck, scapulars, and upper part
of the hack a mixture of black and white in narrow transverse
lines; the longest of the scapulars and the tertials
dark brown ; all the smaller wing-coverts ash-brown ; the
large coverts tipped with white, forming a bar, two or three
of the higher coverts having their white tinged with hay ;
primaries dark brown ; the secondaries forming a speculum
of velvet-black, green and purple, tipped with white ; lower
part of the hack dark brown; upper tail-coverts almost
black, edged with rufous ; tail-feathers pointed, dark brown ;
the chin black; front of the upper part of the neck chestnut
; lower part of the neck in front partly covered with
circular spots of black, on a ground of white, tinged with
pale purple; breast and belly white; sides and flanks
barred with narrow black and wdiite lines; central under
tail-coverts velvet-black; lateral tail-coverts delicate buff-
colour, with a narrow band of velvet-black at the base;
under surface of tail-feathers ash-grey; legs, toes, and
membranes, brownish-grey.
The whole length is fourteen inches and a half. From
the carpal joint to the end of the wing seven inches and a
quarter.
Of male Teal observed constantly in the summer of 1844,
some had lost the sexual distinctions of the plumage by the
27th of July, and all were changed by the 4th of August;
remaining like the females, till they acquired new feathers
at the autumn moult.
The female has the whole of the head speckled with dark
brown, on a ground-colour of light brown ; upper part of
back and scapulars dark brown, each feather with two narrow
transverse bars of buffy-brown ; wing like the male, but the
speculum has more velvet-black, less green, and no purple
colour ; chin pale brown ; lower part of neck on the front
and sides varied with two shades of brown, in crescentic
marks ; breast white; sides, flanks, belly, and under tail-
coverts, dull white, spotted with dark brown.
Varieties of the Teal are occasionally met with ; one in
the collection of Mr. J. Whitaker, has the wings and back
of a light slate-colour, and the breast several shades lighter
than usual.
The nestling is yellowish-white on the under parts ; buff
on the forehead and throat; a dark brown streak from the
forehead to the crown, which, with the upper parts, is brown ;
a dark loral streak, and two other streaks from behind the
eye to the nape, on each side.
The trachea of the male Teal is about five inches in
length, the tube rather narrower near the middle than at
any other p a rt; the bony enlargement of the size and form
represented in the figure below.
A male example of the ‘American Teal’ is stated by
Mr. John Evans, without any description, to have been shot
near Scarborough in November 1851 (Zool. p. 3472) ; but
Mr. W. E. Clarke takes no notice of it in his ‘ Handbook of
Yorkshire Vertebrates.’ In ‘The Naturalist,’ viii. (1858),
p. 168, Mr. W. G-. Gibson, writing from Dumfries, says,
without naming any month, “ a specimen of the Blue