146 THE BIRDS OF IONA AND MULL. 



during the two years that I rambled over a considerable part of 

 Upper Canada I carried with me a gun and an eye towards birds ; 

 but in my present locality, though there is abundance of the 

 common kinds of wild fowl, there is rarely anything to gladden the 

 eye of the collector and make his pulse bound and his aim 

 tremble as he deliberately " gets on " a fine specimen. As you 

 do me the compliment of asking me to contribute some more 

 papers on this subject, I shall be happy to write a letter or two 

 in the old friendly style, though the matters be but small ; and 

 should they be too garrulous (for I am older than I was five years 

 ago) for any other purpose, I dare say they will be an amusement 

 to an old friend. 



In our neighbourhood, and I should suppose generally else- 

 where, this has been a rare season for wild fowl ; the unusually 

 severe winter has assembled more than the ordinary amount of 

 Mallard and Widgeon, with the usual proportion of Pochards, 

 Seals, &c., which mostly congregate where the reflux of the tide 

 leaves an expansive margin of muddy acres on which the hungry 

 million pick up their pasturage. 



When the tide is out more than a mile of good mud is laid 

 bare, prolific in every delicacy dear to the Wading or Web-footed 

 gastronome. Thence you may hear all night long their wild 

 cries ringing on the frozen air ; tribe calling upon tribe in varied 

 cadence, borne in from the distant ebb so distinctly upon the 

 silent night wind, that every characteristic note may be heard and 

 the number of the various species estimated by the observer, even 

 comfortably in bed, half a mile inland. 



But when the moon rises high and near her full, clear and 



