336 MAX17AT, FOB YOUNG SPOILSMEN. 



The English widgeon was first noticed by Mr. J. N. 

 Lawrence in Fulton market, having been shot on Long 

 Island, and the discovery was communicated by him to 

 Mr. Giraud, who has embodied it in his admirable work on 

 the birds of Long Island. Since that period, however, it 

 has been killed so frequently as to merit a place among 

 the birds of America. 



The existence on this continent of the English green- 

 winged teal, which wants the peculiar lunated bar of white, 

 bifurcated at the inferior extremity, crossing the scapulars, 

 which is so conspicuous in the males of the American 

 species, I was myself, I believe, the first to establish ; 

 having remarked the fact — which had induced me, in the 

 first instance, to suppose the distinctive bar a mere casual 

 variation, not a specific distinction — that I had unques- 

 tionably shot many birds in this country, without that 

 mark, to Mr. J. C. Bell, the distinguished naturalist and 

 taxidermist of New York, who had then no knowledge of 

 the bird as belonging to this country, but who informed 

 me only the other day, that recently many specimens have 

 been brought to him. It was previously known to exist 

 in Nova Scotia. 



It is worthy of remark here, that many varieties of 

 wild fowl, formerly confined to extreme northern and 

 southern latitudes, are, of late, greatly extending their 

 ranges, and meeting, as it were, midway between their 

 natural abodes. Several Arctic fowls, which were former- 

 ly never seen westward of Cape Cod, and others of which 

 the farthest eastern limit was the Cape of Florida, now 



