270 NATATORES. ANSER. BERNICLE GOOSE. 



and highly esteemed for the table. Upon the approach of 

 spring it leaves our shores for more northern countries, and 

 by the middle of March the whole have retired. Its summer 

 retreats extend to very high latitudes, as it is known to 

 breed in Iceland, Spitzbergen, Greenland, &c. as well as in 

 Lapland, the northern parts of Russia, and northern Asia. 

 It also inhabits Hudson's Bay, and other polar districts of 

 the American Continent. During its equatorial or winter 

 migration, besides the shores of our own island, it is abun- 

 dant in Holland, France, and parts of Germany. I cannot 

 but notice here, for the lovers of the ridiculous, the wonder- 

 ful accounts given by GERARD, the celebrated botanist, and 

 some others, of the origin of this and the next species from 

 a kind of shell (the Lepas Anatrfera of LINNJEUS); yet are 

 they curious, as exhibiting the great ignorance and conse- 

 quent credulity of the age in which they were written. I 

 refer my readers therefore to GERARD'S Herbal, page 1588, 

 edit. 1636; or to the extracts from it, and other authors, 

 contained in the twelfth volume of SHAW'S Zoology, under 

 the head of the Common Bernicle. In the present species, 

 and in the Brent Goose, we have a slight modification in the 

 form of the bill, which is shorter in proportion to the size of 

 the birds than in the geese already described ; and the lamel- 

 lae of the upper mandible are in a great measure concealed 

 by the reflected edges of the bill. These differences, how- 

 ever, are so trifling, as scarcely to warrant a generic separa- 

 tion, but they lead the way to other forms where such sepa- 

 ration appears necessary. The Bernicle is a bird of hand- 

 some shape, and, from the length of its neck and tarsi, stands 

 high upon the ground. When caught alive, it soon becomes 

 very tame, and thrives well upon grain, Sec. ; but no attempts 

 have been hitherto made to domesticate the breed. 



PLATE 44. represents this bird in about three-fourths of the 

 natural size. 



