GAME BIRDS AND LARGER NON-GAME BIRDS 153 



species. The king eider breeds on the Arctic and Labrador 

 coasts. The Pacific eider breeds on the northern Pacij&c 

 and Arctic coasts, being abundant around the mouth of the 

 Mackenzie River (Plate XVI, 4). 



The great economic importance of the eider as the source 

 of the valuable product, eider-down, a product of particular 

 value in our northern latitudes, should need no emphasis. 

 In the northern European countries of Norway and Iceland 

 the birds are most zealously cared for by the inhabitants, 

 who collect their down from the nests of the birds for com- 

 mercial purposes. They realize fully the importance of 

 conserving the birds, and encourage them by making nest- 

 ing-places, so that they become semi-domesticated, and do 

 not fear the intrusion of their protectors. During the early 

 part of the nesting-season the down is taken, and also a 

 proportion of the eggs, but sufficient eggs are left to enable 

 the birds to rear the young required to keep up the nimi- 

 bers of the birds. How widely different has been the 

 treatment of the American eider on the coasts of Labrador, 

 Newfoundland, and eastern Canada! Owing to the enor- 

 mous destruction of the eggs, not to mention the adult 

 birds, the eider is rapidly nearing the point of extermination 

 on the Atlantic coast. Doctor Grenfell has described to 

 me the ruthless destruction that takes place on the New- 

 foundland and Labrador coasts. For years this relentless 

 destruction has been carried on. It is the modern version 

 of the story of the killing of the goose that laid the golden 

 eggs. In the eider the inhabitants of our coastal lands, all 

 too destitute of commercial resources, have a resource of 

 inestimable value if the birds were protected to the same 

 extent that the eider is protected in northern Europe. A 

 valuable eider-down industry could be developed which 

 would alleviate materially the conditions of life that are 

 endured by the inhabitants of those inhospitable northern 

 shores. 



