36 Bird-Life in Labrador. 



when you have no gun or means of securing them. Their fa- 

 vorite haunts are the stage-heads and other places where re- 

 fuse matter is kept. In Summer they are always seen near the 

 summits of inaccessible crags and on the hilltops in the inte- 

 rior where they breed. In the "Winter, while driving in the 

 dog teams over the frozen ponds, rivers, or across the bays, 

 they often appear, like sentinels, perched on the top of some 

 dead tree overhanging the ice or hovering near as if waiting 

 to pick up any chance refuse that you might leave for them or 

 accidentally drop. In fact, wherever you go in Labrador, and 

 at any season of the year, you will be sure to fall in with one 

 or more of these birds. It always amused me to see them while 

 flying, as I often did, suddenly double up their wings, take 

 an oblique and very peculiar sort of dive, then righting them- 

 selves again at the same time uttering their hoarse croak. 

 Xo one at all familiar with their movements could ever mis- 

 take a raven for a crow, or vice versa, while it was flying. My 

 notes on this bird will perhaps add a few items of interest con- 

 cerning the habits of the species, though, in the main, they 

 but repeat, with a better choice of words perhaps, what has 

 been said above : We have had several ravens hovering about 

 the fish stage all day to-day (October 14) ; the people here 

 seem to regard them as birds of ill omen, and say that they are 

 in league with the devil. You can rarely get any of the na- 

 tives to shoot at one of these birds, no matter how near they 

 come, and they seem positively afraid of the results of so do- 

 ing, fearing that it will bring them misfortune for the remain- 

 der of the year. The bird is really a very difficult one to 

 shoot. I have often lain in wait for it \vith my gun, firing at 

 it both when at rest and on the wing, even at a short distance 

 off, and had it raise its huge black wings and fly slowly away 

 with a harsh and hollow croak that seemed to defy me to try 

 my worst. I have wasted more extra large ducking charges 

 at the raven than at almost any other bird, and obtained the 

 least results. The bird itself is very common everywhere, 

 Summer and Winter, breeding on the high cliffs and hilltops 



