BRENT GOOSE. 26 



is a shy bird, not easily approached ; it swims well, and when wounded 

 can dive with great expertness, as I have more than once witnessed. 

 Its food consists of marine plants, which I have often found in its giz- 

 zard, along with coarse gravel and fragments of shells, which latter 

 were so thick as to lead me to think that the bird had not broken them 

 for the pm"pose of getting at the animal. In walking it moves with 

 lighter and quicker steps than even the Barnacle Goose, Anser leucop- 

 sis. It is very easily tamed, and when thus subjugated eats any kind 

 of grain, and crops the grass well with its head slightly inclined to one 

 side. It has been known to produce young in captivity. 



Of its manner of breeding I am ignorant ; and all that has been 

 stated on the subject is, that it breeds in great numbers in northern 

 latitudes, for example, on the coasts and islands of Hudson's Bay and 

 the Arctic Sea, and that it lays white eggs. 



I have represented a pair which were shot in spring, when their 

 migratory movements are more regular than in autumn. 



Akas Beknicla, Linn, Syst. Nat. voL i. p. 198. —Lath. Ind. Ornitli. vol. ii. p. 844. 

 Beaxt, Anas Bernicla, Wils. Amer. Ornith. vol. viii. p. 131, pi. ^2, fig. 1. 

 Anseh Bernicla, Ch. Bonap., Synops. of Birds of United States, p. 378. 

 Anser Bernicla, Brent Goose, Richards, and Swains. Fauna Bor.-Amer. vol. ii. 



p. 469. 

 Brant or Beent Goose, Nuttdil, Manual, vol. ii. p. 358. 



Adult Male. Plate CCCXCI. Fig. 1. 



Bill much shorter than the head, higher than broad at the base, 

 somewhat conical, slightly depressed toward the end, narrowed and 

 roimded at the tip. Upper mandible with the dorsal line sloping, the 

 ridge a little flattened at the base, convex toward the end, the sides 

 sloping, the edges soft, the oblique marginal lamellae short, transverse, 

 about 25 on each side, the imguis round, convex, striato-denticulate on 

 the inner edge. Nasal groove elliptical, commencing at the base, and 

 extending to beyond the middle of the bill ; nostrils lateral, medial, 

 longitudinal, narrow-elliptical, open, pervious. Lower mandible straight, 

 depressed, with the angle very long, rather wide, somewhat rounded, 

 the sides sloping outwards, the edges soft, with about forty lamellae. 



Head small, oblong, compressed. Neck rather long and slender. 

 Body full, slightly depressed. Feet short, stout, placed a little behind 

 the centre of the body ; legs bai-e a little above the tibio-tarsal joint 



