1870,] REEKS—ON BIRDS OP NEWFOUNDLAND. 291 



following conversation ensued : — " Got two pat fridges then, sir ?" 

 " Yes." " All there was there, I 'spose ?" " Oh, no ; there were 

 ten in all, I think." " Then they was wild I 'spose, sir ?'' " No, 

 they allowed me to get sufficiently near to kill one with each barrel 

 as they rose." " What, sir, you never fired at 'em to wing!" 

 ** Of course I did ; how would you have me shoot at them ?" 

 *' Why, sir, if I had been there I should have walked round and 

 round them pat tridgis till I had got 'em all in a heap, and then I 

 should have killed nearly all at a shot : I never heard of nobody ' 

 firing at apattridge to wing.'' If the settlers could be induced to 

 observe a close time for these and other valuable game birds, the 

 practice of shooting them in this apparently wholesale manner 

 would not greatly diminish their numbers. The willow grouse is 

 called the '• partridge" by the settlers, and frequents beds of alder 

 and dwarf birch in swampy places, especially on the borders of 

 lakes and rivers. It breeds on the ground among stunted black 

 spruce, in rather drier situations. One peculiarity in the New- 

 foundland bird is, that I have veri/ rarely found the middle, or 

 incumbent pair of tail-coverts " entirely white" in winter, as they 

 are stated to be in ' Birds of North America,' p. 634. 



Roch Ptarmigan, L. rupestris (Gmelin). — A truly aipine 

 species in Newfoundland ; rarely found below the line of stunted 

 black spruce, except in the depth of winter, when they descend to 

 the low land and feed on the buds of dwarf trees, sometimes in 

 company with the willow grouse, but I never saw this species 

 perch on trees : it is called by the settlers the *' mountain 

 partridge." 



Gruid^. 



I was informed by one of the settlers that a '' brown crane" was 

 killed a few years since at Codroy, Newfoundland, and some others 

 seen. I am of opinion that they must have been "stragglers," 

 and it is therefore hard to determine the species. Did they really 

 belong to the genus Grus ? 



ARDEIDiE. 



American Bittern, Botaurus lentiginosus, (^Montagu). — A 

 summer migrant to Newfoundland, and the only species of the 

 heron family that I met with. A pair of bitterns are generally 

 found frequenting the margins of wooded lakes and ponds in the 

 lowlands throughout the summer, arriving early in May and 



