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[header] 26

[margin] 4th
week

All of these more numerous. The King
and Long Tailed Duck are shot daily. The
tern resort to Butler Island and like
their allied gulls keep up an incessant
screeching. Seal are numerous on the
shores and the ivory gull -- seeking per=
haps the eggs of the Burgomaster and
the tern come in scanty numers to our
harbour.

In the vegetable kindom -- so peculiarly the
index of season -- the changes were very mar=
ked. Before this month -- the dry stems
of the andromeda were becoming green at their
extremities. Stone crops were in russet
exterior but in active growth within their fol=
=ded [blank space]. The willows had budded
and their catkins made a tolerable show
when placed in proper exposures. But
except these and a few others of kindred
endurance -- the quickening of the ardent
summer had been unavailing.

But with this June month, all the
flower [?] of this starved region broke
upon us. The lichens began to brighten after
the winter's rust. The orange red scutella
of the [blank space] studded the rocks
and the cetraria peep out from the thawed
snow beds. The heaths make a rich
carpet of flowers. Poppy ranunculs saxi=
frage chickweed (Cerastium) &c. &--
crowd between the creeping willows. The
mosses among the last to renew their growth
begin to feel the increasing infiltration of
melted snows and the crannies of the
rocks are alive with a tufted grass
(unknown) the Pera -- the Rumex (R. Digynus)
the Cochleania and perhaps a [smudged]