We must also mention ducks. The male of these birds, as Alexander the Myndian says, is larger than the female, and has a more richly coloured plumage: but the bird which is called the glaucion, from the colour of its. eyes, is a little smaller than the duck. And of the species called boscades the male is marked all over with lines, and he also is less than the duck; and the males have short beaks, too small to be in fair proportion to their size: but the small diver is the least of all aquatic birds, being of a dirty black plumage, and it has a sharp beak, turning upwards towards the eyes, and it goes a great deal under water. There is also another species of the boscades, larger than the duck, but smaller than the chenalopex: but the species which are called phascades are a little larger than the small divers, but in all other respects they resemble the ducks. And the kind called uria are not much smaller than the duck, but as to its plumage it is of a dirty earthenware colour, and it has a log and narrow beak: but the coot, which also has a narrow beak, is of a rounder shape, and is of an ash colour about the stomach, and rather blacker on the back. But Aristophanes in his Acharnians, in the following lines, mentions the dusk and the diver, from whose names (νῆττα) and κολυμβὰς) we get the verbs νήχομαι, to swim, and κολυμβάω, to dive, with a great many other water birds— [p. 624]
Ducks too, and jackdaws, woodcocks too, and coots,And Callimachus also mentions them in his treatise on Birds.
And wrens, and divers.
