Y2 AMERICAN GAME. 



wild oat, zizania aquatica, is plentiful, tliey are found in 

 very great numbers, especially in the spring and sum- 

 mer time, nor are they unfrequently killed on the snipe- 

 grounds of New Jersey, around Chatham, Pine-brook, 

 and the Parcippany meadows on the beautiful Passaic, 

 and on the yet more extensive grounds on the Seneca 

 and Gayuga outlets, in the vicinity of Montezuma 

 Salina, and the salt regions of New York. 



In the shallows of the lake and river St. Clair, above 

 Detroit, on the Riviere aux Canards, and the marshes of 

 Chatham in Canada East, all along the shores of Lake 

 Erie on the Canadian side, especially about Long Point, 

 and in the Grand Kiver, they literally swarm ; while in 

 all the rivers, and shallow rice-lakes on the northern 

 shores of Lake Huron, which are the breeding-places of 

 their countless tribes, they are found, from the breaking 

 up of the ice to the shutting up of the bays and coves in 

 which they feed, in numbers absolutely numberless. 



The Mallard is generally believed to be the parent 

 and progenitor of the domestic duck, which, although 

 far superior in beauty of plumage and grace of form and 

 deportment, it very closely resembles ; yet when or 

 where it was domesticated, is a question entirely dark 

 and never to be settled. It is certain that the domestic 

 duck was unknown to the Greeks and Romans, so late 

 as to the Christian era, although the paintings in the 

 Egyptian tombs demonstrate beyond a peradventure 

 that it was familiar to that wonderful people from a very 



