BRITISH BIRDS. 259 



parts of the plumage, the breast, and a portion of 

 the belly, are of a dull brown, sometimes mixed 

 with grey, and each feather is margined with a 

 lighter colour: the lower part of the neck, the belly, 

 vent, and upper and under tail coverts, pure white : 

 quills and tail black : legs dingy blue. 



This is another useful species which has been 

 reclaimed from a state of nature, and domesticated 

 and multiplied in many parts of Europe, par- 

 ticularly in France and Germany; but is rather 

 uncommon in England. The above figure was 

 taken from a specimen presented to this \vork by 

 Mr. Henry Mewburn, of St. Germain's, Cornwall; 

 the bird w T as shot there in 1819.* It is as familiar, 

 breeds as freely, and is in every respect as valuable 

 as the Common Goose: it is also accounted a great 

 ornament on ponds near gentlemen's seats. Buffon 

 says, "Within these few years, many hundreds 

 inhabited the great canal -at Versailles, \vhere they 

 lived familiarly with the Swans : they were oftener 

 on the grassy margins than in the water. There 

 is at present a great number of them on the mag- 

 nificent pools that decorate the charming gardens 

 of Chantilly." The wild stock whence these birds 

 were taken are found in the northern parts of 

 America; they are one of those immense families, 

 which, when associated with others of the same 

 genus, are said, at certain seasons, to darken the 



* Great numbers of these Geese were driven from their haunts 

 during the severe snow-storm in January and February, 1814; they 

 were taken upon the sea shore, near Hartlepool, and divided among 

 the farmers in the neighbourhood, and bred with their domestic 

 Geese, no pains having been taken to keep the breed pure. 



