CATALOGUE OF BIRDS. I7I 



case. Luckily, it had fallen close to the water's 

 edore, and lay quite dead with wings outspread. 



To show the vitality of this bird, I may add 

 that although shot throuo;h the head it had man- 

 aged to carry away the shot for a considerable 

 distance as if nothing had happened. 



The Bean Goose. 



This species, like the White- Fronted Goose, is 

 only a visitor to the British Islands in the autumn 

 and winter months, returning to more northern 

 latitudes in early spring for breeding purposes. It 

 is more plentiful in the south and west of Ireland 

 than either in England or Scotland, the most 

 favoured spot in the former probably being Cornwall, 

 and in the latter, certain parts of the mainland and 

 some of the western islands. It is of elegant shape, 

 weighs two to three pounds more than the White- 

 Fronted, is altogether a larger bird, and may easily 

 be distinguished from any other of its congeners by 

 the black nail at the tip of the bill, whence, I 

 imagine the prefix of Bean has arisen. My ghillie, 

 John Sullivan, used to call these Wild-Geese the 

 ** Big Scotch Geese " ; said they always arrived on 

 the bogs belonging to the Marquis of Lansdowne 

 after the others had come in, and that you could 

 always distinguish them from the others by their 

 larger size. 



I will now say something about the specimen you 

 see in the case, which was obtained in the same 

 year and in the same general surroundings as the 



M2 



