THE RED-BREASTED GOOSE 401 



Before anchoring in this creek, we ran aground and 

 were an hour or two endeavouring to get the vessel free, 

 being obliged to send two anchors off in order to get 

 her afloat. I went on shore about midnight. When 

 Schwanenberg's second mate left the Kureika I had 

 commissioned him to procure for me what eggs he could 

 before my arrival, and in each case to shoot the bird if 

 possible. He and the first mate had accordingly lost no 

 opportunity of collecting whatever eggs they could find. 

 This collection, small as it was, proved of great value, for 

 I had arrived at my destination too late for most eggs. A 

 very interesting egg was that of the red-breasted goose, 

 which the first mate found on the adjacent island. There 

 were two eggs in the nest, but, shooting the bird while 

 she was sitting, he unfortunately broke one egg. 



On Sunday I spent twenty hours out of the twenty- 

 four in exploring the island. As far as I was able to 

 penetrate, it was all swamps and lakes, with a few dwarf 

 willows dotting it in clumps here and there. Three 

 weeks earlier the whole island had been eight feet under 

 water; it was now about fourteen feet above the level of 

 the Yenesei, so that the river must have fallen about 

 twenty-two feet. The place abounded with birds, but 

 the number of species was small. The commonest 

 was the yellow-headed wagtail. What interested me 

 most in the small collection of eggs which the two mates 

 had procured for me were five sittings of the eggs of the 

 mountain accentor, which were up to that time unknown 

 in collections. These eggs are blue and unspotted, and 

 resemble very closely those of our hedge-sparrow. The 

 mate took me to a nest in which were young birds. It 

 was close to the ground in a dwarf willow-bush. The 

 next commonest bird was the Lapland bunting, but there 

 was no evidence of their breeding, though they had 



2C 



