ANSERES. ( 96 ) ANATID^. 



THE WHOOPEK 



ELK, WHISTLING SWAN, WILD SWAN. 



Cygnus musicus. 



^Twere sweet to mark the setting day 

 On Bourhope's lonely top decay ; 



Thence view the lake, ' with sullen roar, 

 Heave her broad billows to the shore ; 

 And mark the Wild Swans mount the gale. 

 Spread wide through mist t/ieir snowy sail, 

 Atid ever stoop again, to lave 

 Their bosoms on the surging wave. 



Sir Walter Scott, Marmion. 



The earliest record of an appearance of the Wild Swan in 

 the county occurs in a diary kept by Captain Bell, of the 

 Berwickshire Militia, who, about the beginning of this 

 century, resided at Linthill, near Eyemouth. The entry 

 in the diary is as follows: — "October 2ord, 1800. — Saw 

 three Wild Swans— not flying high. Got in the last of 

 my corn crop — oats — weather fine." 



Writing in August 1834, the Rev. J. S. Goldie, minister 

 of Coldstream, says that Wild Swans have been shot in that 

 parish ; '-^ and in January 1835 the Eev. John Turnbull, 

 minister of Eyemouth, mentions that " a few months ago 

 several Swans made their appearance in the bay of Eye- 



1 St. Mary's Loch. 



2 Neiv Statistical Account of Scotland, voL ii. (Berwickshire), p. 206. 



