298 SOME EASY WAYS OF GETTING BIRDS 



days in a cool place in warm weather, but not 

 longer unless you can freeze them. When wanted 

 for the table, remove the skin and all fatty pieces 

 and then stew them. There is another way of 

 cooking them which I think is preferable, but it 

 is wasteful. After skinning as above, take a 

 knife and remove the breasts only, cutting along 

 the bone to the wing, but do not leave any bones on. 

 This will form two nice little pieces of meat. 

 Cook in a frying pan like a steak, using a very 

 small piece of butter, pepper and salt. You will 

 be surprised to see how palatable this is, and few 

 people, unless they know beforehand, will be 

 able to say whether they are eating fresh or salt 

 water birds. 



Sea ducks should never be roasted in a pan or 

 oven, as this brings out the oily taste. Murres, 

 (lomvia troile) which migrate along the St. Law- 

 rence in myriads, in some years, occasionally 

 getting as far west as the Great Lakes, and are 

 killed in thousands during these migrations, are 

 mostly thrown away, being considered unfit for 

 food. If they were cooked in the way last des- 

 cribed, few would throw them away after having 

 once tasted them. 



I have occasionally been asked why the Can- 

 ada jay (perisoreus Canadensis), is called whisky 

 jack. It is a corruption of the Indian name for 

 this bird. Uiske-stian, in Montagnais dialect, 

 means "fat-eater," or "one who hides fat" a 



