BIRDS OF ESSEX COUNTY. 63 



white Geese which are bigger, and gray Geese which are as bigg and bigger 

 then the tame Geese of England, with black legges, black bills, heads and necks 

 black ; . . . . There is of them great abundance. I have had often loco. before 

 the mouth of my gunne." 



The Whistling Swan (Olor colnmbianus), now of accidental occurrence, and 

 probably the Trumpeter Swan {Olor buccinator), never seen now, are frequently 

 referred to by the earlier writers. Wood ^ says : " There be likewise many 

 Swannes which frequent the fresh ponds and rivers, seldome consorting them- 

 selves with Duckes and Geese ; these bee very good meate, the price of one is six 

 shillings." 



Josselyn 2 says : " The water-fowl are these that follow, Hookers or wild 

 Swans, Cranes, Geese of three sorts, grey, white, and the brant Goose, the first 

 and last are best meat, the white are lean and tough and live a long time." 



Higginson,^ writing from Salem in 1630, says : " In winter time this coun- 

 try doth abound with wild geese, wild ducks, and other sea fowle, that a great 

 part of winter the planters have eaten nothing but roast-meate of divers fowles 

 which they have killed." 



Cranes, probably the Sandhill Crane (Gnis mexicana), long since extirpated 

 in Massachusetts, occurred in the early days of the colony. These birds are 

 thus referred to by Thomas Morton : " Cranes there are greate store, that 

 ever more came there at S. Davids day [March i.st], and not before: that day 

 they never would misse. 



These sometimes eate our corne, and doe pay for their presumption well 

 enough ; and serveth there in powther, with turnips, to supply the place of pow- 

 thered beefe, and is a goodly bird in a dishe, and no discommodity." Capt. 

 John Smith, in 16 16, also speaks of Cranes. 



This bird is to be distinguished from the Great Blue Heron, which is still 

 a common bird of the County, and which is now sometimes erroneously called a 

 Crane, but, unlike the true Crane, frequents the marshes and feeds on fish, 

 while the Cranes, as Morton says in his account just quoted, "sometimes eate 

 our corne." 



The shore birds are spoken of by the early historians, although many of 

 their descriptions leave us much in doubt as to the species. Thus Wood says , 

 " The Humilities or Simplicities (as I may rather call them) bee of two sorts: 

 the biggest being as big as a greene Plover, the other as big as birds we call 

 knots in England. Such is the simplicity of the smaller sorts of these birds, 



> Wm. Wood: New England's Prospect, 1634; p. 33 of 1865 reprint. 



- John Josselyn : An Account of two Voyages to New England, 1675 1 P- -7^ of 1833 reprint. 



' Francis Higginson : New England's Plantation, 1630; p. 121 of 1792 reprint. 



