I have a number of names: Mud Hen, Crow Duck, and Blue Peter. It's all the same to me. What's in a name anyway? Wouldn't a rose smell just as sweet if it were named Blue Peter, too?

Well I am an aquatic bird, and can quack with the best of them and swim with them, too. I go along beautifully on the water. My feet are very remarkable, the toes being fringed by a membrane which assists me greatly in swimming as well as walking over the ooze. I call them my mud-boards.

Such a lovely little thing as I was when I came out of my shell! that is what people, who saw me at that time, say. My down was jet-black and my head a bright orange-scarlet mixed with purple and blue. I wish I looked half as handsome now, but you can't paddle around in the mud all day and keep clean. That is I can't. My coat is a sooty-black now and I won't be able to change it as long as I live.

Do you see that bare patch on my forehead! Well, that accounts for some people's calling me a "Bald-headed Coot." Maybe you will be called that some day, too.

I don't often come to dry land, but when I do I march along very gracefully. I can fly, too, though my wings do appear too short for my size. I just stretch my legs out behind my stumpy tail, spread my wings, and away I go.

I swim easily too, with a peculiar bobbing motion of my head and neck. You should just see a lot of us patter over the water, using our feet as much as our wings, when alarmed. And such a cackling as we do keep up! Why, you can hear us quite half a mile.

There is one thing about my face I should like to have changed and that is my nose—my bill I mean. It is an ivory-white and no matter how much I stick it in the mud it will stay white. It is a good mark, you see, for a man with a gun, and I am dreadfully afraid I shall be shot some day. I have seen a number of my mates popped over just on account of their white bills.

I visit you in April and leave you in November when the streams freeze over. I hope you will have pleasant weather next month, for I am making preparation to visit you then.