I 70 love's meinie. 



calls her mate to her assistance, who willingly 

 plucks the soft feathers from his breast to 

 supply the deficienc3^ If the cruel robbery 

 be again repeated, which in former times was 

 frequently the case, the poor eider-duck aban- 

 dons the spot, never to return, and seeks for a 

 new home where she may indulge her maternal 

 instinct undisturbed by the avarice of man." 



129. Now, as I have above told you, these 

 two statements are given on the two sides of 

 the same leaf; and the reader must make what 

 he may of them. Setting the best of my own 

 poor wits at them, it seems to me that the 

 merciless abstraction of down is indeed the 

 usual custom of the inhabitants and visitors ; 

 but that the 'good lady,' referred to by Mr. 

 Shepherd, manages things differently ; and in 

 consequence we are presently farther told of 

 her, (bottom of p. 65,) that "when she first 

 became possessor of the island, the produce of 

 down from the ducks was not more than fifteen 

 pounds weight in the year; but under her 

 careful nurture of twenty years it had risen 

 to nearly one hundred pounds annually. It 

 requires about one pound and a half to make 

 a coverlet for a single bed, and the down is 



