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366 



AUDUBON 





ated under a rock in the grass, and made of a quantity 

 of dried grass, forming a very decided nest, at least much 

 more so than in our Middle States, where the species 

 breed so very abundantly. Wild Geese were seen by 

 our party, and these birds also breed here; we saw 

 Loons and Eider Ducks, Anas obscura ^ and the Fuligula 

 [CEdetnia] americana.'^ We came to our anchorage at 

 twenty minutes past twelve. Tom Lincoln and John 

 heard a Ptarmigan. Toads were abundant. We saw 

 some rare plants, which we preserved, and butterflies and 

 small bees were among the flowers which we gathered. 

 We also saw Red-breasted Mergansers. The male and 

 female Eider Ducks separate as soon as the latter begin 

 to lay; after this they are seen flying in large flocks, each 

 sex separately. We found a dead Basking Shark, six 

 and a half feet long; this fish had been wounded by 

 a harpoon and ran ashore, or was washed there by the 

 waves. At Eastport fish of this kind have been killed 

 thirty feet long. 



June 18. I remained on board all day, drawing; our 

 boats went off to some islands eight or ten miles distant, 

 after birds and eggs, but the day, although very beauti- 

 ful, did not prove valuable to us, as some eggers from 

 Halifax had robbed the places ere the boats arrived. 

 We, however, procured about a dozen of Alca tarda, Uria 

 troile, a female Eider Duck, a male Surf Duck, and a Sand- 

 piper, or Tringa, — which, I cannot ascertain, although 

 the least ^ I ever saw, not the Pusilla of Bonaparte's 

 Synopsis. Many nests of the Eider Duck were seen, 

 some at the edge of the woods, placed under the rampant 

 boughs of the fir-trees, which in this latitude grow only a 

 few inches above the surface of the ground, and to find 

 the nest, these boughs had to be raised. The nests were 

 scooped a few inches deep in the mossy, rotten substance 



* Dusky Duck. ' Scoter Duck. 



« The Least or Wilson's Sandpiper, Tringa {Actodrotnat) minutUla.—'^-^ 



