70 
FRANK FORESTER’S FIELD SPORTS. 
throughout Europe for the singularity of its origin, and the 
transformations it was supposed to undergo previous to its com¬ 
plete organization. Its first appearance was said to be in the 
form of a barnacle-shell adhering to old water-soaked logs, trees, 
and other pieces of wood taken from the sea. Of this Goose¬ 
bearing tree, Gerard in his Herbal, published in 1597, has 
given a formal account, and seems to have reserved it for 
die conclusion of his work, as being the most wonderful of all 
he had to describe. The honest naturalist, however, though his 
belief was fixed, acknowledges that his own personal informa¬ 
tion was derived from certain shells which adhered to a rotten 
tree. That he dragged it out of the sea between Dover and 
Romney in England, in some of which he found living things 
without form or shape ; in others, which were nearer come to 
ripeness, living things ‘ that were very naked, in shape like a 
birde; in others thebirdes covered with soft downe, the shell half 
open, and the birde ready to fall out, which, no doubt, were 
the foules called Barnacles.’ Ridiculous and chimerical as 
this notion was, it had many advocates, and was at that time as 
generally believed and with about as much reason too, as the 
annual submersion of Swallows, so tenaciously insisted on by 
some of our philosophers, and which, like the former absurdity, 
will in its turn disappear before the penetrating radiance and 
calm investigation of truth. 
“ The Brant and Barnacle Goose, though generally reckoned 
two different species, I conceive to be the same. Among those 
large flocks that arrive on our coast about the beginning of 
October, individuals frequently occur corresponding in their 
markings with that called the Barnacle of Europe, that is in 
being the upper parts lighter and the front cheeks and chin 
whitish. These appear evidently a variety of the Brent, proba¬ 
bly young birds. What strengthens this last opinion is the fact, 
that none of them are found so marked on their return north¬ 
ward in the spring. The Brent is expected at Egg Harbor, on 
the coast of New Jersey, about the first of October, and has 
been sometimes seen as early as the twentieth of September 
