THE DOMESTIC GOOSE. 415 



powerful instrument wielded by the hand of Man. But in a 

 mere material point of view, and reckoning on the very smallest 

 scale, we will suppose that a village green supports only fifty 

 brood Geese. The owners of these would be dissatisfied if 

 they got but ten young ones from each in the year, besides 

 Eggs; this gives five hundred Geese per annum, without 

 taking the chance of a second brood. Multiply five hundred 

 by the number of village greens in the kingdom, and we still 

 form a very inadequate estimate of the importance of the bird. 

 And all this with scarcely any outlay. The little trouble they 

 demand, of being secured at night and let out in the morning, 

 of setting the Geese, and " pegging" the Goslings, is a source 

 of amusement and interest to thousands of aged and infirm 

 persons, in whose affections their Geese stand second only to 

 their children and relations. What a pity it is that such 

 cheerful commons should be ever converted into barren 

 thickets and damp Pheasant covers, to afford a school for 

 young sportsmen and rural policemen to practise their several 

 arts in. 



The only damage they do, lies in the quantity of food they 

 consume; the only care they require, is to be saved from 

 thieves and starvation. All the fears and anxieties requisite 

 to educate the Turkey and prepare it for making a proper ap- 

 pearance at table, are with them unnecessary; grass by day, a 

 dry bed at night, and a tolerably attentive mother, being all 

 that is required. Roast Goose, fatted, of course, to the point 

 of repletion, is almost the only luxury that is not thought an 

 extravagance in an economical farm-house; for there are the 

 feathers, to swell the mistress's accumulating stock of beds ; 

 there is the dripping, to enrich the dumpling, pudding, or 

 whatever other farinaceous food may be the fashion of the 

 country for the servants to eat; there are the giblets, to go to 

 market or make a pie for a special occasion, and there is the 



