178 GAME BIRDS. WILD-FOWL AND SHORE BIRDS. 



History. 



There is no sound in nature more stimulating to the mind 

 of the hunter than the call of the Wild Goose in the spring. 

 When the returning sun has burst the icy bonds of our lakes 

 and streams, and nature shows some signs of spring awaken- 

 ing; when the wood frogs begin to croak in the cheerless 

 sodden pool, — then we hear far away in the twilight the free 

 chorus of the Geese as they come coursing on the pathless air 

 and steering toward the pole. The baseless triangle drifting 

 across the sky stirs the blood of every beholder. The wild 

 and solemn clamor ringing down the air turns the mind of 

 the weary worker hemmed in by city walls to memories of 

 open marsh, sounding shore, winding river and placid, land- 

 locked bay. On they go, carrying their message to village 

 and city, town and farm, all over this broad land. 



Never shall I forget my first curious observation of their 

 flight, when a httle child at school. The great flocks came 

 sweeping across the sky, and all the children welcomed them 

 by pointing toward the zenith and calhng "Geese! Geese!" 

 as hour by hour the birds crossed our field of view from 

 horizon to horizon. In those days, and for some time after- 

 ward, Geese were numerous in the migrations in most parts 

 of the State, and sometimes flew very low. Now they are 

 fewer in all except the eastern portions, and usually fly high 

 out of gunshot; but even then they rarely alighted in our 

 ponds and streams in daylight unless decoyed. The flocks 

 of Geese which used to alight in the fields in early days were 

 then a thing of the past, and no one could say, as Morton 

 said (1637), " I have often had one thousand Geese before the 

 muzzle of my gun." Wood (1634) states that the Geese came 

 about " Michelmasse " in the fall, and sometimes two or three 

 thousand gathered in a flock. They remained about six weeks 

 and again about six weeks in spring. 



Of all the observers reporting to me in 1908, only one man 

 outside of the coast counties had seen any perceptible increase 

 of Wild Geese in the last thirty years. Eighteen in the coast 

 counties note an increase (recent in most cases) and eighty- 



