BIRDS OF THE CAMBRIDGE REGION. 



91 



of from ten or a dozen to thirty or forty individuals each. The larger flocks 

 often rose and left the pond, when disturbed, but the single birds, although 

 somewhat restless, were absurdly tame. Some of them were taken alive, others 

 killed with oars, and very many shot by collectors or sportsmen, fifty or more 

 being captured in all. Several killed on the i6th and 17th had their stomachs 

 filled with the remains of young alewives, which in those days abounded in Fresh 

 Pond. 



No inroad at all approaching in magnitude the one just mentioned has since 

 occurred in this region, but my notes supply the following records of smaller, 

 subsequent flights of Dovekies. 



1876, February 21. A single bird, alive but exhausted, picked up in Lexington 

 by a farmer. 



1876, November 20. A heavy northeaster, the wind blowing a gale all day, 

 prostrating telegraph poles, wrecking dilapidated buildings and doing much damage 

 to shipping. On this and the following two days a few Little Auks were seen in or 

 near Cambridge, and one or two were taken. A flock was reported in Mystic River. 

 I did not hear that any were met with very far inland. 



1878, November 22. An easterly storm of considerable energy accompanied by 

 sleety rain and an exceptionally high tide. Three Dovekies were taken in Charles 

 River just above Waltham, and a fourth was caught alive in a coal-yard on Brighton 

 (now Boylston) Street, Cambridge. Still another was found dead on November 26, 

 in a market garden in Arlington. 



[1888, November 25. A furious northeaster swept the entire coast of New Eng- 

 land today. The wind at times reached a velocity of eighty miles an hour. About 

 six inclies of snow fell. These conditions should have caused a heavy flight of Little 

 Auks, but only two specimens have been reported. One of them was exposed for 

 sale in Quincy Market, Boston, the other was brought to one of the Boston taxider- 

 mists. Both were said to have been taken near Boston, but just where I was unable 

 to ascertain.] 



1892, November 3. There was a heavy rainstorm today. A Little Auk, 

 mounted by Mr. M. Abbott Frazar, was shot in one of the Mystic Ponds on this date. 

 Another, sent to Mr. James T. Clark for preservation, was captured about the same 

 time in an empty freight car standing, with open door, on a siding at West Dedham. 



Nuttall, writing of the Little Auks, says : ^ " Those which have been ob- 

 tained in this vicinity, usually in the depth of winter, have sometimes been found 

 in Fresh Pond, and so lean and exhausted, by buffeting weather and fatigue as 

 to allow themselves to be quietly taken up by the hand." This statement is 

 somewhat ambiguous, inasmuch as Fresh Pond is ordinarily closed by ice during 

 the ' depth of winter,' at which season, however, Dovekies may often be found 

 in salt tvatcr along the seacoast near Boston. 



'T. Nuttall, Manual of the Ornithology of the United States and of Canada. The Water 

 Birds, 1834, 532. 



