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Geese in a day, whereas the most expert of the English think 

 it a good day's work to kill thirty. Some years back it was 

 common for an Indian to kill from a thousand to twelve 

 hundred Geese in one season ; but latterly he is reckoned a 

 good hunter that kills three hundred. This is by no means 

 owing to the degeneracy of the natives ; for the Geese of late 

 years do not frequent those parts in such numbers as formerly. 

 The general breeding-place of this bird is not known to any 

 Indian in Hudson's Bay, not even to the Esquimaux who 

 frequent the remotest North. The general route they take 

 in their return to the South in the Fall of the year, is equally 

 unknown ; for though such multitudes of them are seen at 

 Churchill River in the Spring, and are frequently killed to 

 the amount of five or six thousand ; yet in the Fall of the 

 year, seven or eight hundred is considered a good hunt. At 

 York Fort, though only two degrees South of Churchill 

 River, the Geese seasons fluctuate so much, that in some 

 Springs they have salted forty hogsheads, and in others not 

 more than one or two : and at Albany Fort, the Spring season 

 is by no means to be depended on ; but in the fall they fre- 

 quently salt sixty hogsheads of Geese, besides great quantities 

 of Plover. The retreat of those birds in Winter is equally 

 unknown, as that of their breeding-places. I observe in Mr. 

 Pennant's Arctic Zoology, that about Jakutz, and other parts 

 of Siberia, they are caught in great numbers, both in nets, and 

 by decoying them into hovels; but if [441] these are the 

 same birds, they must at times vary as much in manner as 

 they do in situation, for in Hudson's Bay they are the shyest 

 and most watchful of all the species of Geese, never suffering 

 an open approach, not even within two or three gun-shots : 

 yet in some of the rivers near Cumberland House, and at 

 Basquiau, the Indians frequently kill twenty at one shot ; but 

 this is only done in moon-light nights, when the Geese are 

 sitting on the mud, and the sportsmen are perfectly con- 

 cealed from their view. Though the plumage of those Geese 



