The Water-fowl of the Pacific Coast 545 



the land of the gun. Breeding far in the North in 

 great numbers, he spends most of the winter along 

 the upper coast, visiting California only at particu- 

 lar places. Tomales Bay, near San Francisco, and 

 one or two points above are stopping-places, but 

 I can find no record of his entering San Francisco 

 Bay, though thronged by all other water-fowl. 

 From there he skips all the small bays, inlets, 

 and estuaries until he reaches False Bay, a small 

 bay three miles above San Diego Bay. In San 

 Diego Bay he made his principal winter home, but 

 was found again at San Quentin, nearly two hun- 

 dred miles south, after skipping all between. Then 

 after passing another long space he appears at 

 Magdalena Bay in Lower California (Mexico), 

 below which I can find no trace of him. 



Why this avoidance of scores of places appar- 

 ently as good as those at which he stops ? And 

 why is he not seen there even occasionally? 

 Why does he not stop even for an hour to rest his 

 wing weary with long wandering ? Yet he will not 

 stop, even in the night when he does his travelling. 

 And year after year passes without even his 

 voice being heard on bays as large as False Bay 

 and even more free from the hunter, or on inlets 

 and sloughs by the score where the tide brings 

 all the food he can want and large enough to be 

 safe for the wary Canada goose. Yet this little 

 wanderer disdains them all, despises the woof of 



2 N 



