402 BIRDS KILLED BY THE FALLS. 



as many as thirty wild ducks." " Oh, oh," I thought, 

 U I must muse on this ;" so picking my way over slippery 

 rocks and leaping from one to the other, I got out as far 

 as I could into the river and sat down for further con 

 templation. My first occupation was to observe the gulls, 

 and from the spot to which I had thus attained, I could 

 see them watching on the boiling-up tide at the immediate 

 foot of the cascade, and picking up little fish killed by the 

 weight and force of the Fall, so that the why and where 

 fore of the presence of the gulls on the spot was easily 

 settled, their temporary absence also accounted for by 

 the necessities of the breeding season. But how to 

 account for the death of wild ducks I could understand 

 the destruction of tame geese, and for the deaths of the 

 great Northern diver, which I subsequently ascertained 

 so frequently occurred that afforded matter for considera 

 tion. I could not solve the point then, so must recur to 

 it hereafter. 



Having spent some time here, I ascended to my car 

 riage, and ordered the driver to stop in passing at the 

 house of that clever naturalist and bird-stuffer, Mr James 

 Booth, residing at the Falls, Canada West. Here I spent 

 some time in looking at his valuable collection, and at a 

 specimen of the largest beaver I ever saw. From him I 

 procured two or three specimens of . birds in better 

 plumage than my own of the same sort ; and he put the 

 little crayfish I had caught into a bottle of spirits of wine 

 with a young cow- snake, picked up in the road leading 

 to the ferry, and to those added a beautiful limestone im 

 pression of the fossil sycamore leaf. I left him much pleased 

 with my visit. On recrossing the suspension bridge, my 

 carriage pulled up on the American side, at what I 

 suppose is a species of custom-house, for the driver in- 



