186 anatidjE. 



80,000. Calculating that for every bird killed, twenty 

 escaped untouched, and that large flocks remain entirely 

 undisturbed in remote districts, it would follow that the 

 number of geese leaving their breeding grounds by the 

 Hudson's Bay route for the south, must be about 

 1,200,000." Of the numbers that take their flight straight 

 across the country it is difficult to form more than a very 

 vague idea, but the writer in question, computing it at 

 probably two-thirds or more of the former quantity, 

 estimates the flocks that annually pass over the continent 

 at not less than 2,000,000, without including the Brent 

 geese, which are neglected by the Indian tribes generally. 

 Besides this enormous number of geese, the Swans 

 and the majority of the two great divisions of True and 

 Oceanic Ducks, also breed either in the extreme north of 

 Canada, and the Hudson's Bay territories, or just within 

 the arctic circle; and also migrate with their grown-up 

 families in the autumn to the Southern States and the 

 Atlantic coast, returning northward again in the spring; 

 thus traversing the whole of Canada t^vice annually. 

 Hence it is that Canadian wildfowl shooting is perhaps 

 the best in the world, and in the former of these two 

 seasons especially, no sport could be more delightful. 

 The autumn forest literally glows with the brightest 

 crimson, purple, scarlet, and yellow, intermingled with 

 the dark pine; the atmosphere is warm, yet bracing, 



