76 
CANADA GOOSE. 
geese will answer, and wheel, and come nearer the stand. The 
sportsman keeps motionless, and on his knees, with his gun 
cocked the whole time, and never fires till he has seen the eyes 
of the geese. He fires as they are going from him, then picks 
up another gun that lies by him, and discharges that. The 
geese which he has killed he sets upon sticks, as if alive, to 
decoy others ; he also makes artificial birds for the same pur- 
pose. In a good day, for they fly in very uncertain and un- 
equal numbers, a single Indian will kill two hundred. Not- 
withstanding every species of goose has a different call, yet the 
Indians are admirable in their imitations of every one. The 
autumnal flight lasts from the middle of August to the middle 
of October ; those which are taken in this season, when the 
frosts begin, are preserved in their feathers, and left to be frozen 
for the fresh provisions of the winter stock. The feathers con- 
stitute an article of commerce, and are sent to England. 
The vernal flight of the geese lasts from the middle of April 
until the middle of May. Their first appearance coincides 
with the thawing of the swamps, when they are very lean. 
Their arrival from the south is impatiently attended; it is the 
harbinger of the spring, and the month named by the Indians 
the goose moon. They appear usually at their settlements 
about St George’s day, O. S., and fly northward, to nestle in 
security. They prefer islands to the continent, as farther from 
the haunts of man.* 
After such prodigious havoc as thus appears to be made 
among these birds, and their running the gauntlet, if I may so 
speak, for many hundreds of miles through such destructive 
fires, no wonder they should have become more scarce, as well 
as shy, by the time they reach the shores of the United States. 
Their first arrival on the coast of New Jersey is early in 
October, and their first numerous appearance is the sure prog- 
nostic of severe weather. Those which continue all winter 
frequent the shallow bays and marsh islands ; their principal 
Arctic Zoology. 
