CANADA GOOSE. 281 



dinary as it may appear, I am well assured by the testimony of 

 several respectable persons, who have been eye-witnesses to the 

 fact, that they have been also known to return again in the suc- 

 ceeding autumn to their former habitation. These accounts are 

 strongly corroborated by a letter which I some time ago re- 

 ceived from an obliging correspondent at New York; which I 

 shall here give at large, permitting him to tell his story in his 

 own way, and conclude my history of this species. 



"Mr. Platt, a respectable farmer on Long Island, being out 

 shooting in one of the bays which, in that part of the country, 

 abound with water-fowl, wounded a Wild Goose. Being wing- 

 tipped, and unable to fly, he caught it, and brought it home 

 alive. It proved to be a female; and turning it into his yard, 

 with a flock of tame Geese, it soon became quite tame and fa- 

 miliar, and in a little time its wounded wing entirely healed. 

 In the following spring, when the Wild Geese migrate to the 

 northward, a flock passed over Mr. Platt' s barn yard; and just 

 at that moment their leader happening to sound his bugle-note, 

 our Goose, in whom its new habits and enjoyments had not 

 quite extinguished the love of liberty, and remembering the 

 well known sound, spread its wings, mounted into the air, 

 joined the travellers, and soon disappeared. In the succeeding 

 autumn the Wild Geese (as was usual) returned from the north- 

 ward in great numbers, to pass the winter in our bays and rivers. 

 Mr. Platt happened to be standing in his yard when a flock 

 passed directly over his barn. At that instant, he observed three 

 Geese detach themselves from the rest, and after wheeling round 

 several times, alight in the middle of the yard. Imagine his 

 surprise and pleasure, when by certain well remembered signs, 

 he recognized in one of the three his long-lost fugitive. It was 

 she indeed ! She had travelled many hundred miles to the lakes; 

 had there hatched and reared her offspring; and had now re- 

 turned with her little family, to share with them the sweets of 

 civilized life. 



"The truth of the foregoing relation can be attested by many 

 respectable people, to whom Mr. Platt has related the circum- 



VOL. III. 



