SPECIES EXTINCT OR EXTIRPATED. 431 



that speed with a high wind. These estimates were possibly 

 excessive. Nevertheless, this bird's power of flight was so 

 great that it would not take long, under favorable conditions, 

 for it to cross the vast expanse of ocean lying between Labra- 

 dor and the lesser Antilles, which it visited in its southern 

 flight. This Curlew was able to rest on the sea, like the Golden 

 Plover or the Willet,^ and it may have done so, as all shore birds 

 can swim. If it could travel with a fair wind even one hundred 

 miles an hour, it could go from Labrador to the lesser Antilles 

 or about two thousand miles, in twenty hours. It is improb- 

 able that it could make so quick a passage; but it seems 

 possible that it often arrived at the Antilles without landing 

 on the way. 



Apparently a large part of the individuals of this species 

 concentrated in Labrador in August, although many went 

 south through the Mississippi valley region. Some of those 

 that bred in Alaska must have made a journey of more than 

 two thousand miles to reach the Labrador coast. As it is 

 about seven thousand miles from the shores of the Arctic 

 Ocean, where they bred, to Patagonia, where some of them 

 spent the winter, their wonderful annual flight over land 

 and sea must have covered at least fourteen thousand miles, 

 and if some individuals bred in Alaska they may have trav- 

 elled over sixteen thousand miles. 



About the last week in August or sometimes a little earlier 

 the migration from Labrador began. As they rarely alighted 

 on the Massachusetts coast in great numbers except when 

 blown off their course by a storm, and as they were then 

 tired, wet and storm-beaten, they readily were approached 

 by the gunner. When driven to take wing by the death- 

 dealing charge, they started off swiftly; but, being of an 

 affectionate disposition, they often returned to their strug- 

 gling, wounded companions, and hovered solicitously over them 

 until another storm of shot again tore through their thinned 

 and broken ranks. They were decoyed easily by the gunner, 

 who could give a close imitation of their call. They were 

 much too innocent and confiding for their own good. As 



» Mackay, George H. : Auk, 1896, p. 90. 



