THE BEAN GOOSE. 29 



Value of goose feathers. 



A young goose is generally reckoned very; 

 good eating; yet the feathers of this bird still 

 farther increase its value. Of goose feathers 

 most of our beds in Europe are composed; in 

 the countries bordering on the Levant, and in all 

 Asia, the use of them is utterly unknown. They 

 there use mattrasses, stuffed with wool, or camel's 

 hair, or cotton ; and the warmth of their climate 

 may perhaps make them dispense with cushions 

 of a softer kind. But how it happens that the 

 ancients had not the use of feather-beds is sur- 

 prising : Pliny tells us, indeed that they made 

 bolsters of feathers to lay their heads on ; and 

 this serves as a proof that they turned feathers 

 to no other uses. 



The feathers of Somersetshire are most in 

 esteem; those of Ireland are reckoned the worst. 

 Hudson's Bay also furnishes very nne leather*, 

 supposed to be of the goose kind. 



THE BE4N GOOSE. 



THIS is chiefly distinguished from the do- 

 mestic goose by the resemblance of the nail of 

 its bill to a horse-bean. The head and neck are 

 of an ash brown, tinged with ferruginous; breast 

 and belly dirty white; back, a plain ash-colour; 

 feet and legs saffron, and claws black. They 

 appear in the fens of Lincolnshire in autumn, 



