130 THE FISHERIES OF THE UNITED STATES. 



13. Limosa uropygialis. White-rumped Godwit. 



This wader is a mere chance visitor, never breeding here. It comes la a straggling manner, early in May, and 

 jtasses northward over the islands, hardly stopping on the way. It reappears, toward the end of August, goiug 

 south, in flocks of a dozen to fifty, making then, as before, scarcely an appreciable visit. 



14. Heteroscelus incanus. Wanderisg Tattler. 



This bird is also migratory, and does not breed here. It comes every year early in June, aud subsequently 

 reappears toward the end of July, when I again observed it. It may be obtained ou the rocky beaches, where it 

 flits at the surf-wash, shy and quiet. 



15. Numenius borealis. Eskimo Cuklew. 



I never saw but the single specimen, which I shot aud preserved, on the seal-islands while up there; but the 

 natives assured me that some years, aiul quite often, it appears in large flacks during the fall. This oue was 

 procured by me in June, 1872, on St. Paul island. 



16. Philacte canagica. Emperor Goose. 



This goose of the great Yukou river gets over here by mistake, I fancy, for the flock of which I witnessed 

 the capture, landed on St. Paul island so exhausted, tiiat the natives ran the birds down in open chase over the 

 grass. 1 found the flesh of Philacta, contrary to report, free from any unpleasant flavor, and in fact very good. 

 The objectionable quality is only skin deep, and may be got rid of by the least care, when the cook prepares it for 

 the table. 



17. Branta canadensis. White-collaued Goose; " Ciiorxie Gocse." 



This species, like the former, seems to be a mere straggler and irregular visitor, evidently driven by high winds 

 to rest here for a brief period, ere they resume their customary lines of migration along the mainland. 



18. Anas boschas. Mall.^^rd Dv(^. 



A pair of these fine birds bred on the island of St. Paul during the season of 1872, at Polavina lake, and 

 several were observed later in the fall. The mallard I also noticed on St. George island, but the natives say it is 

 not a regular visitor. 



19. Mareca penelope. Widgeon. 



It is an interesting fiict, that this widgeon, as my specimens attest, which visits the Pribylov islands, is not M. 

 americana, as might be anticipated, but it is the true M. peneloiie. I saw only a few specimens, and saw them 

 rarely. They were solitary examples, never in pairs, and it does not breed on the islands; ai^parently the few 

 individuals, which I noted during two years of observation, were wind-bound or estray. 



20. Harelda glacialis. Long-Tailed Duck; " Saafka." 



This noisy, chattering example is common and resident. It appears everywhere on the pools, ponds, sloughs, 

 and lakes of the two islands; in limited numbers, however. The iSaafla is a very lively bird, particularly in the 

 spring, when with the breaking up of the ice it flies into the open reaches of water, and raises its peciiliar, sonorous^ 

 and reiterated cry oi ah-naah-nadkyah, which rings cheerfully u pon the ear after the silence and desolate dearth of 

 an ice-bound winter. 



21. Histrionicus torquatus. Harlequin Duck. 



My experience with this bird is radically different from anotlier writer, he stating that it is an essentially solitary 

 species, found alone or in pairs, only in the most retired spots, on the small rivers flowing into the Yukon, where it 

 breeds.* It is the most gregarious of all the duck tribe known to the.se islands ; flocks of a hundred, closely bunched 

 together, may be found at every turn by the traveler on the coast ; nor is it particularly wild or shy, for every morning 

 at St. George, whenever I chose to walk to the water's edge beneath the village, and less than a quarter of a mile 

 distant, I could have a shot at fifty or a hundred of these birds, just as I had enjoyed such an opportunity in the early 

 dawning previou.sly; but it is a remarkably silent bird, and from it I never heard anycry whatever during the whole 

 year; for it is about the island, unless the ice drives it away, throughout that entire period. It is a very social duck, 

 solitary pairs never being seen away from the flock. The females seem to outnumber the males two to one; but, the 

 strangest thing about it was my total inability, aud that of the natives, too — for I oflered an inordinate reward — to 

 find its eggs or nest. It must breed about here, but whether deep in the rock interstices of the beach shiugle, or 

 flying by night to the high ridges inland, I am ignorant. 



22. Somateria Stellsri. Steller's Eider. 



From the village hill at St. Paul, in May, 1872, I shot two specimens of this duck, and then not knowing as 

 much about the seal island cats as I speedily learned thereafter, the fresh stufted specimens were literally torn into 

 a thousand fragments by these abominable felines. It is, as I did not see it afterward during my residence on the 

 group, a straggler, and nothing more. 



23. Graculus bicristatus. Red-eaced Cormorant; "Oreel." 



As this bird of Palhis is found about the islands during the whole winter as well as the summer, despite the 

 weather, perched on the sheltered bluffs, the natives regard it with a species of afi"ection, for it furnishes the only 



'Trans. Chicago Acud., i, 298. 



