344 
ANAS, OR GOOSE TRIBE. 
country, is derived chiefly from the journals kept by 
the traders : — 
Engineer Cantonment, Lat. 4H°, 22d of February. * 
Cumberland House, 
Athabasca Lake, 
Slave Lake, 
Fort Enterprise, 
54o from the 8th to the 12th of April. 
59o about the 20th -25th of April. 
61° about the 1st -6th of May. 
64° 30" about the 12th-20th of May. 
“ The results of registers for various years kept at 
Fort Churchill, on Hudson’s Bay, lat. 59°, give the 
27th of April and 14th of May as the earliest and 
latest arrivals of different seasons. Their eggs have 
been found as early as the 15th of May. They collect 
in the marshes of that neighbourhood in some autumns 
as early as August 16th, and depart about September 
10th, rarely continuing until October 10th, which is 
considered as a very late fall. 
“ The other two species seen in the interior arrive in 
separate flocks, generally about six or eight days after 
the Canada geese. One of these, the laughing goose, 
keeps the middle part of the continent in its migrations, 
and is rarely seen on the coast of Hudson’s Bay. Its 
breeding station is to the northward even of the resorts 
of the snow goose, and is still unknown to the 
Europeans. The note of this bird has some resem- 
blance to the laugh of a man, and from this its name 
has been derived, and not as Wilson supposes, from 
the grinning appearance of its mandibles. The Indians 
imitate its cry by moving the hand quickly against the 
lips, whilst they repeat the syllable wah . 
“ The snow goose, in its migration northwards, is seen 
both in the interior and on the sea-coast, and in num- 
bers exceeding the other two. 
“ The brent goose (Anas bernicla) is found only on 
the coast of Hudson’s Bay ; and the barnacle, (Anas 
* In Long’s Expedition to the Rocky Mountains , the great 
migration of geese is stated to commence at Engineer Cantonment, 
in lat. 411° on the 22d of February, and to terminate at the latter 
end of March. 
