250 
ward, according to the severity of the 
season. They are then met with on the 
British shores, but are more plentiful in 
Ireland, where they are taken in nets 
placed across the rivers, and are esteemed 
very good eating ; they disperse over the 
marshes in the interior parts, feeding upon 
the roots, and also on the blades of the 
long coarse grasses and plants which grow 
in the water, they will also eat berries and 
marine insects. 
These birds fly in wedge shaped flocks, 
making a continual cackling. They some- 
times migrate in such congregated myriads 
as to starve each other. It appears ac- 
cording to Buflbn, that previous to 1740, 
the Brent was scarcely known on the coasts 
of Picardy : during the winter of that year 
they appeared in such immense swarms 
avid committed such devastation in the 
corn fields, that the people were literally 
raised en masse in order to attempt their 
extirpation, which, however, it seems they 
could not effect, and a change in the wea- 
ther only, caused these unwelcome visitants 
to depart. During the same season these 
