42 
AN AT ID yE. 
The geographical distribution of this bird has yet to be ascertained. 
It was first described in 1833 from a specimen procured in the north 
of France, and has since been noticed in Holland and Belgium.* 
THE WHITE-FRONTED GOOSE. 
Laughing Goose. 
Anser albifrons, Gmel. (sp.) 
Anas „ „ 
„ ery thr opus, Linn. 
Is a regular winter visitant to Ireland ; 
Where, as in Great Britain, it is, next to the bean goose, the 
species most frequently met with. About Belfast this bird is 
little known ; occasionally — not so often as every winter — one or 
two are brought on sale to the town. One was noted, on account 
of the rarity of its appearance under such circumstances, as killed 
on the 26th October, 1822, by a wigeon-shooter from his barrel, 
near Conswater, Belfast Bay, as he was awaiting the flying of 
these birds: it was accompanied by two others; its weight was 
five pounds, the irides of a hazel-colour. A young bird of the 
year, killed at Strangford Lough on the 19th December, 1834, 
came under my inspection, as did two others obtained there on the 
12th, and a third on the 30th of January, 1836. About the 1st 
of December, 1844, two of these birds, of which the black-barred 
bellies, marking the species, were distinctly seen by my orni- 
thological informant, flew low over the shore of Belfast Bay, 
proceeding in a southerly direction. 
Like all the geese, this species soon becomes familiar, and 
sometimes even bold. An immature one, brought from North 
America and sent to the Belfast Botanic Garden, was particularly 
fond of human society, probably from the kindness it had expe- 
rienced on shipboard, and would at all times leave its pond to join 
men at work in the vicinity. But its gala day was when a military 
* Be Selys, ‘ Faune Beige,’ p. 138. 
