256 duck. 



Oie sauvage, Buf. ix. p. 30. t. 2. PI. enl. 989. Hist. Prov. i. 343. 



Bean Goose, Gen. Syn. vi. 404. Br. Zool. ii. No. 267. pi. 94. f. 2. Id. 1812. ii. 233. 



pi. 39. Arct. Zool. ii. No. 472. Lewin,'v\\b pl'l 239. Beio. ii. p. 306. JFa/c. i. 



pi. 65. Pufc. Dor*, p. 20. Orw. £>«'cf. # Snpp. 



SMALLER than the Common Goose ; length two feet seven 

 inches; breadth nearly five feet; weight six pounds. Bill small, 

 much compressed near the end, whitish, and sometimes pale red in 

 the middle, and black at the base and nail ; irides rufous brown ; 

 head and neck cinereous brown, tinged with ferruginous ; breast and 

 belly dirty white, clouded with cinereous; sides and scapulars dark 

 ash-colour, edged with white; back plain ash; tail coverts white; 

 at the bend of the wing a knob ; lesser wing coverts light grey, nearly 

 white; the middle deeper, tipped with white; quills grey, tipped 

 with black ; legs and feet saffron-colour; claws black. 



It sometimes varies both in weight and size, as well as in plumage, 

 as a specimen sent to me out of Suffolk, was full three feet in length, 

 and weighed seven pounds. Bill from the nostrils to the nail deep 

 brownish red; wing coverts grey; the greater tipped with white; 

 the second quills tipped, and margined with white; the greater 

 plain dusky black; legs dull brownish red; claws black; the rest 

 like the other. 



Inhabits England in the winter, most frequent in Lincolnshire 

 and Yorkshire, where it comes in autumn,* and departs in May : 

 they sometimes alight in the corn fields, and do much damage to the 

 green wheat; breed in great numbers in Lewis, one of the Hebrides, 

 and no doubt also where other wild Geese are found, having been, 

 till lately, not distinguished from them. Observed also at Hudson's 

 Bay,t but whether common there we do not learn. 



* Among them some have been observed quite white. — Arct. Zool. f Arct. Zool. 



