Goose

“ Beside this bird of awful poesy stood a gray goose of very ordinary aspect.
"Stuffed goose is no such rarity," observed I. "Why do you preserve such a specimen in your museum?"
"It is one of the flock whose cackling saved the Roman Capitol," answered the virtuoso. "Many geese have cackled and hissed both before and since; but none, like those, have clamored themselves into immortality." ”

“ The white-fronted goose is the fourth and last on our list of grey geese—four forms of one species, as some hold—and, like the others, it comes to us from the north in winter, but is more common in Ireland than in Great Britain. It is like the bean-goose in size, but differs from it in its white front, and from the grey lag goose in having the under parts more speckled with black feathers. Its voice is most like that of the grey lag, but is more trumpet-like in sound, and the rapidly repeated notes give its cry a laughter-like character; laughing goose is one of its common names. ”

“ Every one of the party stood on tiptoe to mark the spot at which it should rise, but all in vain, when the man at the rudder accidentally looked down over the stern and there saw the goose, its body immersed, the point of its bill alone above water, and its feet busily engaged in propelling it so as to keep pace with the movements of the boat. ”

“ The old goose sat down by the side of the nest to die. As the young goose had never reared a brood before, nor been inside the kitchen, the elder must somehow have explained the duties to her, and the younger have understood and accepted the charge. ”

“ Once upon a time there was a goose girl who tended her flock in a green meadow. The meadow was dotted with forget-me-nots and yellow buttercups, and the sun shone down on it; her geese were fine blue geese and uncommonly knowing. She should have been the happiest goose girl in all the world, but she was not. She thought not of the beautiful meadow nor of her geese that were a pleasure to tend, for they were so wise and always did her bidding; but instead this goose girl wept every day because she longed to marry a certain lord who lived in a gray stone castle at the top of a high hill. ”

“ A simple northern direction leads, according to the point of departure, to very different regions, sometimes to Siberia, sometimes to Spitzbergen and Lapland, sometimes to the northern islands of Iceland, Greenland, and what others shall I say? But no such vague destination will do for the goose. The bird must return to its native country, of which it retains an ineffaceable remembrance, just as a man, through all the shifts and changes of his stirring life, preserves the cherished memory of his own village. The goose, then, must again find the sea whose murmur it listened to in youth. ”

“ At the same time, the silent and sentimental goose is swimming upon the bosom of the muddy pool, now and then plunging its long neck into the recesses of the element upon which it floats—​happy if perchance some insect, lizard, or tadpole may reward its search. ”

“ Here roast goose stuffed with apples is a dish loved quite openly and simply by people who would consider that the number of their quarterings raises them above any suspicion as to the refinement of their tastes, however many geese they may eat, and however much they may enjoy them; and I remember one lady, whose ancestors, probably all having loved goose, reached back up to a quite giddy antiquity, casting a gloom over a dinner table by removing as much of the skin or crackling of the goose as she could when it came to her, remarking, amidst a mournful silence, that it was her favourite part. ”

“ A goose, when it is swimming, is a very handsome bird, and it is most admirable when it appears on the table roasted of a delightful brown, with a dish of apple-sauce to keep it company. But, for some reason, the goose has never been treated with proper consideration. It has for hundreds of years, I expect, been considered as a silly bird. But there never was a greater mistake. If we looked at the thing in the proper light, we would not be at all ashamed to be called a goose. ”

“ The goose must be all larded, and basted over with butter, to make her the more fit to be eaten, and may roast the better: put then fire about her, but do not make too much haste, when as you see her begin to roast; for by walking about, and flying here and there, being cooped in by the fire that stops her way out, the unwearied goose is kept in; she will fall to drink the water to quench her thirst and cool her heart, and all her body, and the apple-sauce will make her dung, and cleanse and empty her. ”

“ Just a common Wild Goose of North America. In the spring and fall you will see great flocks of us flying overhead, an old Gander in the lead, crying honk, honk as loud as he can. Our nests are only simple hollows in the sand, on the shores of lakes and rivers, around which are placed a few sticks and twigs, the five eggs laid on a layer of gray down.
"You're a Goose."
That's a polite way some people have of calling another stupid, but there are Geese and Geese as well as men and men. ”

“ What, though the goose, of which thou art a part, has, indeed, been roasted alive by a slow fire, in order to increase thy divine proportions—yet has not our Almanach—the Almanach des Gourmands—truly declared that the goose rejoiced amid all her tortures—because of the glory that awaited her? ”

“ The Gander and the Bantam-Cock.
A goose was seated on her eggs in a quiet corner, not far from a horse-pond, in a farmyard. Up and down before her strode a game-cock, which, watching the calm looks and contented manner of the goose, which contrasted so greatly with his own fiery disposition, began to get angry,—just as human beings who are out of sorts sometimes do with those who appear happy and smiling. ”

“ In many a lonely farmhouse throughout the land you will be told that the goose is the better watch-dog.
When we consider this bird purely from the æsthetic point of view—and here I am speaking of geese generally, all of the thirty species of the sub-family Anserinæ, distributed over the cold and temperate regions of the globe—we find that several of them possess a rich and beautiful colouring, and, if not so proud, often a more graceful carriage than our domestic bird, or its original, the wild grey-lag goose. ”

“ I forgot to say that the mountain goose (Figs. 1 and 2) is not a bird but a tree. It is humorously called a goose by the woodsmen because they all make their beds of its "feathers." It is the sapin of the French-Canadians, the cho-kho-tung of the New York Indians, the balsam of the tenderfoot, the Christmas-tree of the little folk, and that particular Coniferæ known by the dry-as-dust botanist as Abies. There is nothing in nature which has a wilder, more sylvan and charming perfume than the balsam, and the scout who has not slept in the woods on a balsam bed has a pleasure in store for him. ”

“ Success in the goose hunt seems to elate the Indian more than in anything else. Why, I could never find out. It may be because it is the first spring hunting after the long, dreary winter, and there is the natural gladness that the pleasant springtime has come again. Whatever it may be, I noticed for years more noisy mirth and earnest congratulations on success in the goose hunt than in anything else. ”

“ Goose has few enemies in the water to fear. Our chicks are too large to be pulled under the water by turtles, and our nest is too well defended by the sentry goose for us to fear the fox or the wolf. But you, poor Mrs. Grebe, you are indeed sorely put to it. You must do two things. First, I am sure, you must build farther out from the shore; and, second, you must take your children with you on your back when they first venture over the pond. ”

“ And, whether they pipe us free from rats or from mice,
If we've promised them aught, let us keep our promise.
Robert Browning.
THE GOOSE
I knew an old wife lean and poor,
Her rags scarce held together;
There strode a stranger to the door,
And it was windy weather.
He held a goose upon his arm,
He utter'd rhyme and reason,
"Here, take the goose, and keep you warm,
It is a stormy season."
She caught the white goose by the leg,
A goose—'twas no great matter.
The goose let fall a golden egg
With cackle and with clatter. ”

“ A Goose has no more than the thick Joints of the Legs and Wings left to the Body; the Feet, and the Pinnions being cut off, to accompany the other Giblets, which consist of the Head and Neck, with the Liver and Gizzard. Then at the bottom of the Apron of the Goose A, cut an hole, and draw the Rump through it; then pass a Skewer through the small part of the Leg, through the Body, near the Back, as at B; and another Skewer through the thinnest part of the Wings, and through the Body, near the Back, as at C, and it will be right. ”

“ I said, "We have killed a goose in the barnyard, a wild goose." "No," said he "Don't handle him; I want to feel of your head first to see if you have any bump of memory." Father said, "Do you see that band of geese flying in a circle next to the hill? You used to tell me you could understand this little goose's language and could talk some of it. If you remember any of it now, go out there as near as they will let you approach them and tell them they need not wait for their friend; he is never coming back." ”

“ In these annual goose hunts all the Indians who can handle a gun take part. The news of the arrival of the first goose fills a whole village with excitement, and nothing can keep the people from rushing off to the different points, which they each claim year after year, where they hastily build their nests and set their decoys. ”

“ These people have learned by heart the story of the goose that laid the golden egg; and while they hunt the eggs very early in the morning and with great thoroughness, they do not actually kill the bird. The goose, on the other hand, does all in its power to direct its energies in some other direction than the laying of eggs, and with some success. ”

“ Besides the cathedral and adjacent houses, I see the frozen surface of the river, dotted here and there with goose-stands, for this is the time for geese, and each goose-stand should be supplied with one or two smart hunters, whose decoy geese and their perfect imitation of the goose’s call generally succeed in alluring the silly birds to their destruction. ”

“ The most marked characteristic of a goose is not stupidity but an affectionate disposition. The ancient Egyptians noted this, and in their hieroglyphic writing a goose stood for "son." The goose is a very intelligent and interesting bird. It is of a most social nature and becomes very much attached not only to its mates but to other animals and to people. ”

“ In Russia, ganders are taught to fight each other, and a trained gander has been known to sell for twenty pounds.
There is a very beautiful goose called the Egyptian Goose, or goose of the Nile. Its feathers [72] are very handsomely marked with black, brown, green, and white. It is the goose so often represented, in old fresco paintings of heathen temples, by the ancients. This goose is famous for its devotion to its young. The old birds will remain with their offspring during times of most imminent danger, refusing to save themselves and leave their young in peril. ”

“ Know that in its wild state [118] the goose is an impassioned traveler, even more so than its companion, the duck. Influenced by considerations of convenience, the latter often nests in our latitudes; the goose is more given to mistrust and passes us by. For the laying of its eggs it must seek regions as near the Pole as possible, regions of never-melting ice. The desolate wastes of Greenland and Spitzbergen, and, still farther north, the islands lost in the fogs of the polar ocean, are the regions whither they feel bound to return every summer. ”

“ In the midst of my preparations it occurred to me that I might employ Michael as a decoy to lure the geese within gunshot. Sometimes a domestic goose is used for this purpose, but seldom with complete success. The wild goose is an intelligent bird, and rarely places implicit confidence in his domesticated relative.
In a secluded bight some miles down the coast I moored a small raft near shore and tethered Michael to it by a stout string fastened to his leg. ”

“ At first they laid their gins, their citations, and anathemas for the Goose, and now they are lying in wait for some of you; but since the Goose, a tame creature and a domestic fowl with no power to reach great heights in his flight, hath yet broken through their nets, we may the more confidently expect that other birds, which by God’s word and by their lives soar to high places, will break their traps in pieces. ”

“ GOOSE (a common Teut. word, O. Eng. gós, pl. gés, Ger. Gans, O. Norse gás, from Aryan root, ghans, whence Sans. haṇsá, Lat. anser (for hanser) , Gr. χήν, &c.) , the general English name for a considerable number of birds, belonging to the family Anatidae of modern ornithologists, which are mostly larger than ducks and less than swans. Technically the word goose is reserved for the female, the male being called gander (A.-S. gandra) . ”

“ The most important species of goose, and the type of the genus Anser, is undoubtedly that which is the origin of the well-known domestic race (see Poultry) , the Anser ferus or A. cinereus of most naturalists, commonly called in English the grey or grey lag [1] goose, a bird of exceedingly wide range in the Old World, apparently breeding where suitable localities are to be found in most European countries from Lapland to Spain and Bulgaria. ”