64 
THE BEAN GOOSE. 
of their passage overhead during the night from this 
cause, when otherwise they would not have been 
discovered. 
In summer some of the Hebrides are, we believe, 
regularly visited by them for the purpose of breed- 
ing ; and the northern counties of Scotland, as the 
limit of their range, likewise receive a considerable 
number of pairs for a similar purpose. * In 1834, 
we had the satisfaction of seeing them during in- 
cubation, upon several of the larger lochs in Suther- 
landshire, on some of which they assembled in 
considerable numbers. The first party was met 
with about twelve miles up Loch Shin, and when 
walking amidst some long heath, a short distance 
from the water’s edge, on a piece of very broken 
ground, an old goose was raised from her brood of 
newly hatched young ; after allowing herself to be 
nearly trampled on, the whole scrambled, as it were, 
to the water, and, when fairly afloat, the young 
were left to themselves, the parent instinctively 
knowing that when on that element they were 
comparatively safe, which their activity in paddling 
from the shore, and repeatedly diving, abundantly 
warranted. On Loch Naver, broods were again seen, 
and specimens of the young were procured about 
a fortnight or three weeks old, though their powers 
in the w T ater rendered their capture, even with a 
boat, a work of exertion and difficulty. On Loch 
Laighal they were more abundant still, though 
* “ A few pairs, it is said, breed annually in Sunbiggin 
Tam, near Orton, Westmoreland.” Yarrell, iii. p. 61. 
