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CANADA GOOSE. BRANT, OR BRENT GOOSE. 



THE CANADA GOOSE. 



This is a bird somewhat bigger than the tame Goose. The bill, the 

 bead, and the neck, are black ; and under the throat there is a broad 

 white band, like a crescent. The breast, the upper part of the bellj, 

 the back, and wing-coverts, are dusky brown ; the lower parts of the 

 ueck and belly, and upper tail-coverts, white. The quills and tail 

 are black, and the legs dark lead-color. 



Canada Geese inhabit the more distant parts of North America, 

 Immense flocks of these birds appear annually in the spring in 

 Hudson's Bay: they pass further north to breed ; and return south- 

 ward in the autumn. The English at Hudson's IBay depend greatly 

 on Geese, of this and other kinds, for their support ; and in favorable 

 years they often kill three or four thousand, which they salt and 

 barrel. The arrival of the birds is impatiently waited, because they 

 are considered the harbingers of the spring, and the month iu v/hich 

 they return is named by the Indians the Goose Moon. 



The English settlers send out their servants, as well as the Indiani*. 

 to shoot these birds 

 on their passage. 

 The men for this 

 purpose form of 

 boughs a row of 

 huts, at gun-shot 

 distance from each 

 other, and in a line 

 across the vast 

 marshes of the 

 country. The 

 sportsman remains 

 notionless, and on 

 his knees, witli his 

 gun cocked the 

 whole time ; and 

 does not fire till he 

 can perceive the 

 eyes of the Geese. 

 The Geese that he 

 has killed, he sets up on sticks, as if alive, to decoy others ; he also 

 makes artificial birds for the same purpose. 



THE BRANT, OR BRENT GOOSE. 



CANADA GOOSE. 



The Brent is another of the hardy aquatic birds common to the hy- 

 perboreal regions of both continents. They breed in great luimbers on 

 the coasts and islands of Hudson's Bay and the Arctic Sea, and are 

 rarely seen in the interior. In Europe they proceed to the most 

 northern isles of Greenland, and to the drearv shores of Spitzbergen. 

 In winter they are very abundant in Holland and in Ireland, as 



