WILDFOWL IN THE GREAT BELT. 4 1 I 



as widgeon, golden eye, etc., that at times congregate at 

 openings in the ice, is enormous. When in the winter of 

 1853, which was very severe, Mr. Alexander Keiller was 

 crossing the Great Belt in an ice boat which was then entirely 

 frozen over, with the exception of a very narrow channel in 

 the middle he saw such multitudes of fowl as filled him 

 with astonishment. Billions (said he) would give no idea of 

 their numbers; and when they took wing, it was not simul- 

 taneously, but in succession, like unto clouds of dust that 

 arise from a highway, when swept by a whirlwind. Owing 

 to their being so closely packed together, it would have been 

 impossible for them all to have flown up at once. When 

 they were all fairly on the wing, they literally darkened the 

 air. The open channel was fringed with dead and dying: 

 many had perished with starvation, and not a few owing to 

 their helpless condition, had been killed with sticks ; others 

 again had been destroyed by birds of prey, more especially 

 eagles, several of which were seen sitting, gorged with their 

 victims." * 



This gives a good idea of what one of these vast 

 assemblages is like ; and reading between the lines, 

 we see how unwillingly these poor birds are driven 

 from their native wilds; and how they cling to the 

 last strip of closing water, before they take wing and 

 fly away to foreign lands. But the imperious necessity 

 of want leaves them no alternative: thus we also 

 obtain an insight into one of the phases of that fierce 

 struggle for existence, which is everywhere going on 

 in the world around us among every order of creation. 

 Life therefore is, as we have already remarked, a 

 continual warfare, always being waged to keep itself 

 in existence ; rest and peace are at best but temporary 

 intervals of intermission in this perpetual struggle. 



* The Game and Wildfowl of Norway and Sweden, by Captain L. 

 Lloyd, 1867, pp. 370371. 



