PERMANENT RESIDENTS OF THE POLAR ZONE. 303 



and the vast quantities of bird life still existing in this 

 same region, says: 



" Never did I see in any country so much game as in 

 Lapland. The shooter need only wander a few miles from 

 the village (Quickjock) and I am certain that on any day 

 he will be able to shoot more game than he can carry home. 

 For capercailzie, hazel grouse, and willow grouse, the shooter 

 can hardly go wrong. Every fell literally swarms with ptar- 

 migan, dotterel, golden plover, and mountain hare. For flap- 

 per shooting in July, Lapland would be hard to beat, for 

 this country is the great breeding ground of half the wild fowl 

 in Europe. Scoter, velvet duck, scaup duck, golden eye, 

 pintail, widgeon, wild swan, bean, and white-fronted geese, 

 flock in hundreds as soon as the ice breaks up to these 

 northern wilds, where they can breed in security far from 

 the haunts of man." * 



The more delicate and smaller birds are somewhat 

 later arrivals than these hardy northern wildfowl; but 

 they were there, however, in thousands, just as Mr. 

 Seebohm describes them to have been in North-east 

 Siberia, notwithstanding the intensely rigorous nature 

 of its climate. 



Thus far we have confined our observations prin- 

 cipally to the migratory birds, which are visitors during 

 a brief period of the year to the arctic regions; caus- 

 ing these solitudes to appear replete with numerous 

 beautiful forms of life, and glad with merry voices of 

 birds. There are however certain kinds of birds and 

 animals which make their permanent home there, and 

 winter amid the drifting snows. 



These are the ptarmigan, or snow grouse (Lagopus 

 Rupcstris) the arctic hare (Lepus Glacialis] two or 



* A Spring and Summer in Lapland (a bird collector's tour), by 

 Horace W. Wheelwright ("Old Bushman"), 1871, p. 145. 



