274 On the Physical and Geographical Distribution 



the one a bird of passage, that comes about Michaelmas and 

 goes off about March ; but there is a larger kind, which 

 stays and breeds here, particularly in the Bog of Allen," 

 vol. i., p. 333. Harris, in his History of Down, speaks of the 

 '' great harrow goose being found in a red bog in the Ardes 

 near Kirkiston," but says nothing of its breeding there. An 

 octogenarian friend has, however, informed me, that a rela- 

 tive often told him that he had robbed the nests of wild geese 

 in this very locality, Kirkiston flow — red bog of Harris ; — the 

 period of his doing so was previous to the year 1775. There 

 is little doubt that the true wild goose {A. ferus) was the 

 bird alluded to, as it formerly bred plentifully in the fens of 

 England, though for a considerable period tliey, as well as 

 the bogs of Ireland, have been deserted by it. 



The golden eagle is becoming annually more rare, and is 

 now even " very scarce" in its former stronghold, the county 

 of Kerry. The kite, remarked by Smith, in his History of 

 Cork (1749), to be so common as to " need no particular de- 

 scription," and to remain " all the year,^' has been known in 

 the present century only as an extremely rare visitant to any 

 part of the island ; this species would be afi'ected by the ab- 

 sence of wood. The bittern, on the other hand, affected by 

 the draining of bogs, has almost ceased to breed in Ireland, 

 though it commonly did so throughout the island, until a late 

 period. It now ranks as little more than an occasional win- 

 ter visitant, from more northern countries. The curlew, 

 golden plover, lapwing, and others, have been driven from 

 many of their breeding grounds by the drainage of the bogs ; 

 as has the shell drake from many rabbit-burrows, which are 

 no longer retired, owing to the increase of population. This 

 has likewise influenced the whimbrel to change its haunts 

 around Belfast, where, until the last forty or fifty years, it 

 regularly frequented the pastures, including the upland ones, 

 during the few weeks of its sojourn when on migration north- 

 wards. Of late years, it has been seen only on the sea-shore ; 

 pastures and bogs seemed to be its favourite places of resort 

 in spring. The total disappearance of the beautiful goldfinch 

 and bullfinch, from districts which they had regularly fre- 

 quented, the varying increase and decrease of the swallow 



