508 APPENDIX. 



the ruffed grouse, which is also plentiful as high as the 

 56th parallel. Other birds of this genus inhabit the 

 plains of the Columbia, but those we have mentioned 

 are the most serviceable to the Indian tribes that inhabit 

 the districts through which Captain Back passed. 



Passenger Pigeon. (Columba migratoria.) F. B. A. 2. 



p. 363. 



This pigeon, which breeds in almost incredible num- 

 bers in some parts of the United States, visits the fur 

 countries up to the 62nd parallel of latitude, but not 

 in such quantities anywhere to the northward of Lake 

 Winipeg, as to contribute much to the support of the 

 natives : at the south end of that lake, indeed, for a 

 month or two in summer, when the floods have over- 

 flowed the low lands, and no four-footed game is to be 

 procured, a few families of Indians subsist upon this 

 bird. It visits the north after the termination of the 

 breeding season in the United States. Captain James 

 Ross saw a single pigeon of this species as high as 

 latitude 73J° in Baffin's Bay : it flew on board the 

 Victory during a storm, and must have strayed from a 

 great distance. The wind, as we find by a reference to 

 Sir John Ross's narrative, blew from the north-east at 

 the beginning of the gale, shifting afterwards to the 

 eastward. As the Victory was to the northward of the 

 island of Disco at the time, if the bird came in either of 

 these directions, it must have taken flight from the 

 northern part of Greenland, but it is not likely to have 

 found food on that barren Coast. 



The Piping Plover. (Charadrius melodus Bonap.) 



A specimen of this pretty plover was obtained by Mr. 

 King on Lake Winipeg, and that piece of water is 



