Habits of the Canada Goose. 257 



she went; and seeming very uneasy when she was handled. 

 On these occasions she would run up to the person who de- 

 tained her guardian, and make a sort of cackling noise, and 

 would never appear easy till she had been restored to liberty. 

 When she had completed her second month, to prevent all 

 possibility of escape, we deprived one of her wings of its volar 

 powers, and ordered the gamekeeper to wing a male, that 

 she might not be alone. The keeper having executed his 

 commission, the two birds were introduced to each other ; 

 but the male, being very shy, skulked in corners, and did not 

 at all seem to relish either his new situation, or his new mate: 

 in about a month he escaped, and we never saw him after. 

 We now allowed the female larger range than she had hitherto 

 enjoyed, so that she could now resort to the neighbouring 

 ponds. She was soon joined by a sweetheart, and the loving 

 couple rambled about at pleasure; now sailing with stately 

 mien over the pellucid lake, now grazing in the meadow, and 

 anon reposing on the verdant bank. When they were ap- 

 proached, the male did not fly away until he was pursued so 

 closely as to be in danger of being caught : he remained with 

 his mate as long as was consistent with his liberty ; when that 

 was in danger, and not till then, he deserted the female. 



In 1832 I possessed myself of several of the wild goslings; 

 two of them passed into the hands of a neighbouring farmer, 

 in whose possession they have remained ever since. They 

 associate with his domesticated grey-leg geese, and are very 

 peaceable. 



I do not find this bird included in any work on British birds, 

 except in the History of British Birds by Bewick. That 

 celebrated artist, however, included several birds in his work 

 which are not British, such as the Canary finch, the pintado, 

 the turkey, the fowl, the pavo, the pheasant, and others. In 

 Pennant's British Zoology there is no mention of it; but this 

 work, although very excellent for the time when it was first 

 published (1776), is now, in the present comparatively ad- 

 vanced state of zoology, felt to be very defective. Nor is it 

 in Lewin's Birds of Britain with their Eggs, published in 1800. 

 In the second edition of Montagu's Ornithological Dictionary, 

 edited by Rennie, all that is given under the head Canada 

 goose, is " an erroneous name for the bernacle goose." Tem- 

 minck makes no mention of it in his Manuel d' Ornithologie ; 

 nor does Stewart in his Elements of the Natural History of 

 the Animal Kingdom. Willughby, the illustrious author of 

 the folio on Ornithology published in 1678, gives a short de- 

 scription and two figures. After noting the plumage, all he 

 says is, " The title shows whence it comes : we saw and de- 



