344 E. Billings on the occurrence oj 



scaith, aa although there is sometimes destruction dire among 

 some lots that approach the gun, and that feed in quarters fre- 

 quented by hunters, yet innumerable families of them alight on 

 remote and quiet feeding ground, remain there unmolested, and 

 take wing when the cold sets in, with their numbers intact. I 

 must allow the correctness of this remark, and the deduction to 

 be drawn from it is, that 1,200,000 geese leave their breeding 

 grounds by the Hudson's Bay line of march for the genial south. 

 Of the numbers to the westward along the arctic coast, that wend 

 their way to their winter quarters straight across the continent, 

 we can form but a very vague opinion, but computing it at two- 

 thirds or more of the quantity supposed to leave the eastern part 

 of the arctic coast, we cannot have less than two millions of 

 geese, composing the numerous battalions which pass over the 

 continent between the Atlantic and the Rocky Mountains, borne 

 aloft generally like the scud, and as swiftly hastened on, by the 

 force of the boreal blast. 



I ought to observe that the Brant geese, Bernicla Brenta^ are 

 not included in the above estimate. They are pretty numerous 

 on the Atlantic coast, but are quite neglected by the Indians in 

 general of Hudson's Bay. 



Two small species of south-west habitat, the Dendrocygna 

 Autumnalis and D.fulva never come north, as far as I know. I 

 have never seen the first, but have shot one out of a pair of the 

 latter on the banks of the Columbia, above Okanagan. This I 

 daresay is usually its limit to the north, and I believe it has never 

 been seen to the eastward of the great stony ridge. Neither of 

 these elegant little geese ever visit Hudson's Bay. 



ARTICLE XXY — On the occurrence of Graptolites in the base 

 of the Lower Silurian. By E. BiLLlNGS, F.G.S., Ceological 

 Survey of Canada. 



In an excellent work upon the Lower Silurian rocks of Bhst- 

 land in Russia, by M. Friedrich Schmidt,* the following 

 groups are made out and well authenticated by copious lists of 

 fossils from every division. 



* Untersuchungen iiber die Silurische Formation von Ehstland Nord- 

 Livland und Oesel. Von Mag. Friedeick Schmidt. 8vo. pp. 250. "With 

 maps. Dorfrat, 1858. 



