(716 Some Noteworthy Birds. [ October, 
capacious for him to fill, so he killed the bird in order to have it 
stuffed. . 
The winter of 1877 brought to the coast of New Jersey an 
unusual number of the Arctic dovekies, Mergulus alle. I was 
much interested with these queer but amiable little fellows. I 
held the idea that in their high northern range, they even visit 
the Pole, thus putting to blush our efforts in that direction. A 
boy on his way to school saw a bird acting very strangely by the 
' side of a small stream. It was six miles from the sea, and 
entirely beyond tidal reach. The boy captured it, a simple mat- 
ter, as he had only to go and pick it up. He took it to-school, 
where the heat and dryness occasioned it much suffering, while 
its odd appearance and singular action caused much amusement. 
It stood so bolt upright that the scholars said the bird stood on 
its tail. When the lad got home a tub of water was procured, 
and then came the fun. The bird seemed crazed with delight. It 
ducked and dove and splashed. Then it would make a dash, 
fetching up against the side of the tub in a manner not altogether 
“ healthy ;” but then Mergulus is not the only biped that takes a 
winter tub in an injudicious way. I had furnished the local 
editor a paragraph in which was given the systematic name of 
the bird. Another specimen was found in a neighboring vil- 
lage, standing on the wood-pile in the back yard of a house, also 
some distance from salt water. It was mounted by the local 
taxidermist, who ambitiously named it from the newspaper para- 
graph. It found its way to the bar-room of the tavern, where I 
saw it, and was told its name by the obliging landlord, who said 
that he got it from the bird-stuffer, who told him that it was scien- 
tific. “Ah, indeed! Could you tell me what it means?” “ Oh, 
-yes! Our doctor says Mergulus alle means all-sea-gull.” It would 
have been neither courtesy nor policy for me to say that mine 
host and the doctor were gulls all over. 
: I am at a loss to conceive why these birds, so thoroughly | 
= marine in their nature, come so far inland. Flight must be very 
- laborious to them, and every motion on the land is awkward to 4 
degree. But in the water, all is truly wonderful—there the bird 
_ displays grace, speed and a certain refinement of motion. There — 
. is much to wonder at and to admire in the sea dove’s ways when 
in her own element. Just stand with us on the bluff at Long 
Branch. There is a high swell, for the wind is pretty stiff and 
