352 BIRDS OF THE WEST OF SCOTLAND. 



have been disturbed by boats or otherwise. Brent geese afford 

 excellent eating, their favourite food being a sweet grass which 

 grows on the flats in shallow water. 



On the east coast of Scotland the Brent Goose is particularly 

 abundant in certain firths or estuaries, and is found through- 

 out the winter months in tolerably large flocks from Berwick 

 to Orkney. Selby speaks of having been informed that twenty- 

 two were killed at one shot near Holy Island; and a writer 

 in the ' Edinburgh Journal of Natural History' for May, 1837 

 probably Mr Macgillivray, the editor states that he had seen a 

 flock of ten thousand Brent Geese in the Cromarty Firth between 

 Invergordon and Cromarty ferry. He does not, however, say 

 what means he took to count them. 



THE RED-BREASTED GOOSE. 



ANSER RUFICOLLIS. 



THE late Dr Fleming, in his meritorious work on British Animals, 

 thus announces the occurrence of a specimen of this rare straggler 

 in Scotland: "One was shot near Berwick-on-Tweed by Mr 

 Burney, gunsmith, and sent to Mr Bulloch, in whose possession I 

 saw it in May, 1818." Another, said to have been killed in the 

 county of Caithness, is alluded to by Mr Wilson, but the date and 

 precise locality are not given : the specimen is still preserved in 

 the collection which belonged to the late Mr Sinclair of Wick. A 

 third appears to have been seen for several days in the immediate 

 vicinity of the loch of Strathbeg many years ago a notice of 

 which was sent to Professor Macgillivray by the Rev. Mr Smith 

 of Monquhitter, who stated that the species had been " recognised 

 by more than one individual well conversant with ornithology." 



THE EGYPTIAN GOOSE. 

 ANSER EGYPTIACUS. 



THIS species appears to be of irregular occurrence both in the 

 eastern and western coasts of Scotland. It is generally met with 

 in flocks during winter, and although these exhibit all the wariness 

 of ordinary wild fowl, it is very doubtful whether they can be 



