CHAPTER XIX. 



SWIMMING BIRDS. 



SWANS, in my lengthened experience, I have never seen 

 in lower latitudes than the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, 

 and it requires very severe weather indeed to force them 

 farther southward; however, they are occasionally found 

 on the coast of Georgia. Last season I spent the winter 

 upon a large arm of the sea in Maryland, and as the frosts 

 were unusually protracted, swans were abundant. Their 

 ordinary habitat may, therefore, be considered to stretch 

 from Virginia to the Arctic regions; in the latter they 

 spend their summer. As they are of little use for the 

 table, but seldom commit damage to the crops, and are ex- 

 tremely ornamental, it is a great pity to destroy them, and, 

 thanks to their extreme wariness, this is seldom accom- 

 plished. Moreover, they are so powerful on the wing, and 

 their covering of down so dense, that they must be within 

 easy range for the gunner to bring them to bag. As a 

 rule, I confidently believe that half these birds that are 

 shot, escape to die a miserable death from hemorrhage or 

 starvation. 



Although I have obtained shots at swans, they were 

 more frequently the result of chance than intention. How- 

 ever, last winter, I determined to obtain a specimen for 

 myself, and two others for friends, on which the taxi- 

 dermist should exercise his skill, so that I might retain a 

 memento of my sojourn on the Maryland swamp- washed 

 shores of the Chesapeake. The weather had been very 

 variable, jumping, with those sudden changes peculiar to 



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