Male with an elongated, compressed, rounded crest, the tail with eighteen feathers; bill black, feet yellowish-brown; upper part of the head, back, smaller wing-coverts, quills, and tail brownish-black; sides of the head, upper half of neck all round, the broad extremities of the large feathers on the shoulders, the scapulars, inner secondaries, and larger wing-coverts, greenish-black; a broad patch of white behind the eye, very conspicuous in the erected crest; lower part of neck and breast also white, as are the speculum and the central part of the inner secondaries; sides beautifully marked with undulated transverse lines of yellowish-brown and brownish-black; lower tail-coverts whitish, similarly undulated. Female much smaller, with the crest less elongated, and of looser texture; bill brownish-black, towards the base orange; upper part of head, including the crest, yellowish-brown; chin whitish; upper part of neck all round, and sides of head greyish-brown; general colour of the back, upper surface of wings, tail, and sides, blackish-brown, the feathers edged with paler. Young, when fledged, like the female, but with the crest shorter. _Male_, 19, 26. _Female_, 17-1/2, 24. Breeds sparingly in South Carolina, along the Mississippi, Ohio, and the Great Lakes, as well as further northward. Abundant, during autumn and winter, on all the western and southern waters; rarer in the Middle Atlantic Districts. Mergus cucullatus, Bonap. Syn. p. 397. Hooded Merganser, Mergus cucullatus, Wils. Amer. Orn. v. viii. p. 79. Mergus cucullatus, Hooded Merganser, Swains. & Rich. F. Bor. Amer. v. ii. p. 463. Hooded Merganser, Nutt. Man. v. ii. p. 465. Hooded Merganser, Mergus cucullatus, Aud. Orn. Biog. v. iii. p. 246; v. v. p. 619. 415. 4. Mergus Albellus, Linn. White Merganser.--Smew. White Nun. Plate CCCXLVII. Male and Female.