° s ' ^ General Notes. \ h C 



GENERAL NOTES. 



An Abundance of Murres in the Environs of Quebec. — Since the 15th 

 of November last, numerous flocks of Murres 1 have been seen flying over 

 the river before Quebec ; hundreds have been shot by sportsmen and 

 some have even been killed with sticks near the wharves. The cold in 

 December has been from 15 to 25 Reaumur, but it did not seem to 

 inconvenience them. Several, however, that had left the water to rest 

 on floating ice found themselves unable to remove on account of 

 their wet feet freezing to it; two live specimens thus captured have been 

 brought to me. The presence of these birds is a novelty here, as they are 

 never met with in the environs of the city. Several have even strayed 

 away into the mountains about ten miles from the river; they were 

 exhausted and starving. After the 20th of December their numbers con- 

 siderably decreased till the Sth of January, when the last were seen. 

 Their presence is probably due to hurricanes in the Gulf of St. Lawrence 

 driving them towards the southwest. — C. E. Dionne, Quebec, Can. 



The Double-crested Cormorant. — I have read with interest an article 

 on the 'Habits of the Double-crested Cormorant' in 'The Auk' for January, 

 1894. For the last ten years I have spent one day in the last part of Sep- 

 tember on the Graves at the entrance to Boston Harbor, the resort for 

 the Cormorants of the north shore. I try to get there on a rising tide, 

 believing that the Cormorants which I drive away fly to an outlying ledge 

 of the Brewsters and there sit on the seaweed until driven off by the 

 tide, when they flyback to the high rocks of the Graves. I generally take 

 two decoys which I put on the top of the rocks and hide myself in a cleft. 

 I generally shoot four or five and try and justify my doing so by giving 

 them to an old inhabitant of Swampscott, in his day a sportsman, who 

 puts them through that process of dissolution which is said to make Coot 

 palatable (but which doesn't), and eats them. I have often seen the balls 

 offish bones lying on the rocks described by Mr. Mackay, rejections after 

 digestion by the Cormorant, and have, as he says, invariably found the 

 throat of the bird full offish, generally the common sea perch. — Charles 

 P. Curtis, Jr., Boston, Mass. 



Correction. — In my article 'Habits of the Double-crested Cormorant 

 in Rhode Island' (Auk, Jan. 1894, P- 2 °) "Cancer irroratus Say = P««- 

 opeus sayi Smith" should read "Cancer irroratus Say and Pa nop ens say i 

 Smith." — Geo. M. Mackay, Nantucket, Mass. 



In Re Dutcher on the Labrador Duck. — Fearing that my statement in 

 the January 'Auk,' p. 11, lines 1 and 2, — "D. M. Cole and his associate, 

 Mr. Cary, saw a female duck with a brood of young which he was sure 

 was this species," — may give a wrong impression, notwithstanding the 

 conclusion stated at the close of the paragraph, I now state that the bird 



1 [A specimen sent to Dr. Jonathan Dwight, Jr., proved to be Uria lomvia. — Edd.] 



