Preconfederation Ornithology

Introduction

Philip Henry Gosse was a well-known 19th century naturalist and author. He has been extensively studied and many articles and books have been written about him. Two interesting accounts of Gosse's life that provide an overview of his life and work, and his association with Canada, can be found in the following works:

1). Philip Henry Gosse in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography Online (www.oxforddnb.com) Laurence Croft. 1993

2). P. H. Gosse in Newfoundland and Lower Canada. The Archives of Natural History 20 (1) 1-29

Gosse in Newfoundland and Quebec

This paper provides a very brief biography of Gosse. The main focus is to evaluate his Canadian ornithological writings which appear in The Canadian Naturalist first published in 1840.

Gosse was born in Worcester and grew up in modest circumstances in Poole, Dorset. He showed an early interest in natural history which was encouraged by his aunt, the gifted naturalist Susan Gosse.

Gosse started his career as office clerk. He first came to Carbonear, Newfoundland in1827 when he secured a clerical position with local merchant Slade, Elson & Company. Gosse resided in Carbonear for five years where he developed his interest in natural history, in particular Newfoundland entomology. On a furlough to England in 1832 he developed an interest in religion which would have major impacts on his life and career.

Gosse returned to Newfoundland where he met an emigrant family from Liverpool and joined the Methodist Church. At his time Gosse began to take a much more serious interest in natural history as a potential career by writing his first work: Entomologia Terrae Novae. This work was never published but it is considered by the scientific community as an important early work in Newfoundland and Canadian entomology. With his new friends Gosse decided to leave Newfoundland and take up farming in the Eastern Townships of Quebec.

The following is a very brief precis history of the Townships from the Blogspot of Richard Brown:

The British American Land Company (BALC) played a significant role in attracting British citizens to the region [Eastern Townships]. In the early 1830s, the BALC purchased 250,000 acres of crown reserves from the government in the townships of Shefford, Sherbrooke and Stanstead, as well as 600,000 acres of unsurveyed St. Francis territory......to ensure that the area would be English and loyal to Britain, instead of French Canadian or American. To accomplish this, the BALC published information in 1835 that was almost entirely bogus leading potential settlers to believe that the climate of the region and the condition of the soil were favourable. It also falsely stated that the area was easily accessible from Quebec City, Trois Rivières and Montreal especially as the roads leading to these major cities from the townships were extremely difficult to travel.......The settlers chose vacant lands in Shefford, Richmond, Brome, and Stanstead that did not offer the best soil since Americans had already taken the most fertile land. [Initial settlement in the Townships started in the late 1790s with the United Empire Loyalists emigrating after the American Revolution.]

Gosse bought a farm in the hamlet of Waterville. This village is located 8 kms east of North Hatley, and 18 kms south of Sherbrooke. As presaged by Richard Brown this turned out to be a poor choice. He soon discovered that trying to make a living on poor-quality land with a limited growing season was one of hardship. Despite his disappointment, the irrepressible Gosse satisfied his inquiring mind by learning to identify the trees, plants, mammals, birds and reptiles in his new environment, and making notes of his many observations on the wildlife he encountered. During the long winters he assembling them into a second manuscript.

Gosse joined the two leading Quebec societies with an interest in natural history: the Literary and Historical Society of Quebec (LHSQ) founded in 1824, and the Montreal Natural History Society (MNHS), founded in 1827. Gosse contributed specimens to the new MNHS museum and wrote a paper on natural history which he submitted to LHSQ. This paper does not appear in subsequent lists of LHSQ publications. These associations may well have provided him with knowledgeable contacts and an awareness of the writings of some of the key North American naturalists such Alexander Wilson, Charles Lucien Bonaparte and Thomas Nuttall. Gosse was particularly impressed with their work and skillfully incorporated excerpts of their writings into his narrative which was to become The Canadian Naturalist, published in 1840.

When Gosse came to Waterville in 1835 he tried to establish a religious commune with his two friends from Liverpool. Like his attempts at farming this proved unsuccessful. locals referred to him as "that crazy Englishman who goes about picking up bugs." (Thwaite)

Gosse abandoned Canada in the spring of 1838 travelling to Philadelphia, one of the key American centres of natural history. He provides a very interesting insight in Naturalist about his reasons for going there in a discussion about his "Saw-whetter" (Saw-whet Owl) he encountered in Quebec.

I have asked Mr. Titian Peale, the venerable Professor Nuttall, and other ornithologists of Philadelphia, about it, but can obtain no information on the subject of the author of the sound: it seems to be " Vox et praeterea nihil." Carver, in his amusing travels, mentions it as being heard near Lake Superior, naming it, if I recollect rightly, the Whetsaw. It may possibly be known, but I find nothing of it in Wilson or Bonaparte. Professor Nuttall was acquainted with the note, but told me plainly the bird was unknown.

This small passage is clearly demonstrates that Gosse's interest in birds had grown more serious during his residence in Canada and he felt at home seeking out answers from the cream of the American ornithologists available.

In going to America Gosse had decided to look for a position as a teacher. In Quebec he had supplemented his income with temporary teaching assignments. The experience appears to have had a positive impact. On the advice of paleontologist, T. C. Conrad, Gosse moved to Alabama. He took up a position in the small town of Clairborne, northeast of Mobile. Gosse quickly realized that he had made another poor career choice. Finding local religious attitudes to slavery distasteful, after a brief residence of less than a year, Gosse returned to London in early 1839.

Gosse completed his manuscript of his Lower Canada natural history experiences which was published as The Canadian Naturalist in 1840. In his Preface he discusses the book's concept:

The plan of the Work consists of a series of conversations on the subject of natural history, supposed to pass between a father and son, during successive walks, taken at the various seasons of the year: so that it may be considered as in some degree a kind of Canadian " Naturalist's Calendar." As the form of dialogue has of late become somewhat  "out of fashion," the Author feels it to be due to the public to explain the reasons which induced him to throw the Work into such a shape. He thought that by taking the reader, as it were, and transporting him into the midst of the very scenes and objects represented, a life and a vigour might be preserved, which would be wanting in a formal narrative.  [Naturalist viii]

The Canadian Naturalist received a positive reception. However the nature writer's life Gosse had chosen was a perilous one and he struggled to make a living. To make ends meet he agreed to go to Jamaica in 1844 to collect natural history specimens. In total he spent 18 months on the island which resulted in his writing three books: The Birds of Jamaica (1847), Illustrations to the Birds of Jamaica (1849-1849) and A Naturalist's Sojourn to Jamaica (1851).

The author of his Oxford Dictionary biography considers Sojourn his finest work. Noted naturalist Stephen Jay Gould commenting on Sojourn called Gosse "the David Attenborough of his day, Britain's finest popular narrator of nature's fascination". David Lack in his Island Biology Illustrated by the Land Birds of Jamaica suggested Gosse's Birds ":...was far ahead of its time and remained one of the best bird books on any part of the world for at least half a century." Today Gosse is considered the Father of Jamaican ornithology.

In Britain Gosse soon became known as a great popularizer of natural history. He wrote many subsequent volumes that made him one of Britain's best-known naturalists. A fine tribute to Gosse the naturalist was written by David B. Stewart in the Biological Dictionary of American and Canadian Naturalists and Environmentalists:

Gosse's books on Canada and Jamaica set the pattern for much of his later work and established  value of field observations as contrasted with custom of the time, when Natural History was far     too much a science of dead things: a necrology.

Due his strong religious beliefs, and his position, Gosse became a critic of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. This unfortunate development impaired his career. A fortunate second marriage in 1860, and an inheritance in 1864. provided financial security. He died in 1888.

The Canadian Naturalist

Gosse lived in Lower Canada for less than three years. By the time he left Quebec in early in 1838 he had over ten years Canadian field experience. Naturalist written by a developing scientist with its populist style and full with interesting facts about Canadian wildlife and ornithology is unique in the early literature of the natural history of Canada.

Given Gosse's subsequent career one would certainly be remiss to exclude him. A closer examination his ornithological writings in Naturalist and a comparison with other ornithological material of the 1816-1840 period reveal that he was the third most important ornithologist in Quebec during this period. Only John James Audubon's research on the Quebec north shore in 1833 and Archibald Hall's analysis of the ornithological contents of the Montreal Natural History Museum in 1839, are more important. The ornithological contributions of Audubon and Hall to Quebec ornithology are discussed elsewhere on this website.

An overview of the bird records of Quebec ornithologists of the period will be found in Quebec Bird Records 1816-1840. Prior to 1816 the only ornithologist of consequence after the conquest (1759) was Thomas Davies (c1737-1812) who was posted to Quebec between 1786 and 1790. Davies is discussed under 18th Century Quebec.

In total Gosse discusses 65 species of birds. All are identified by their common names and contemporary scientific names. For this reason one is left in no doubt about which species Gosse is referring to. Only eight birds are mentioned in passing, the remainder, a full 57 species, are discussed in various amounts of detail. In some cases Gosse provides brief descriptions, in others considerable detail. The references to birds are interspersed throughout the text with interesting factual details on atmospheric observations, climatic changes, trees, plants, mammals, and other wildlife.

Gosse's tone, interplay of species, and style may be in no small part due to his choice of using question (son) and answer (father) style. While in a more normal work such as his Birds of Jamaica where he might normally include detailed description, known range, food preferences, habits, behavior etc for all species, he chose a more informal style occasionally grouping species such as the woodpeckers and finches or providing occasional field observations on individual species.

His discussion of some of the Canadian finches and other species in Naturalist illustrates this approach:

Question:  Son asking about the appearance of a moth in March

Answer: The appearance of a living moth at this season is worthy of note.---Ah! there is a flock of those beautiful birds, the Pine Grosbeaks (Loxia Enudeator). They are by far the most splendid of our winter birds; observe how rich the crimson of the males: the females, as in most instances where the males are red, are of a yellowish-olive colour. They delight in the horrors of winter, for even in the desolate region around Hudson's Bay, they are only transient spring visitors, passing on still farther to the north. I have seen the species in Newfoundland, but I believe that there, as here, it is rare. Among some of the common little crossbills that were hopping about the house yesterday, I noticed one that differed from them, by having two bands of white across the wing.

Question: Was it [the White-winged Crossbill] a distinct species?

Answer:  Yes: it is called the White- winged Crossbill (Curvirostra Leucoptera). This is another of our rare birds; so much so, that the indefatigable Wilson, in his researches over this continent, appears never to have met with more than one specimen. Bonaparte says it is common round Hudson's Bay, and on the borders of Lake Ontario. I observed a pair last spring, as late as the 29th of April, in a flock of the common species, which I closely and particularly examined. They were fearless, and allowed me to stand within ten feet of them, for some time. I observed in the male, a black mark proceeding from the back of the eye, curving outward, and ending about half an inch below the eye, which Wilson has not noticed: the tips of the quill feathers appeared to be edged with white, forming as the wings met across the rump, three or four short white bands.

In answer to another question from his son:

Father: You are thinking of the Snow Bunting, a bird of a different genus, Emberiza, from which this may be easily distinguished by its colour: it being of a dark slate colour, with a very light, almost white, bill, the contrast of which with the nearly black head, makes it a very marked bird. It is here vulgarly called the Chip-bird [Dark-eyed Junco]. This Fringilla does not winter with us; I believe its name of Snowbird is derived from its appearing in Pennsylvania about the time of first snow. It is the earliest comer of our spring visitants, usually arriving a day or two before the Song Sparrow. It is of a more elegant shape than most of its tribe.

Gosse was much more than a dry ornithologist. His interest in imparting the joy of birds is well encapsulated in the following passage dealing with bird song:

Son: How very pleasant it is to listen to the warbling, after the long, dull silence of winter.

Father: I never hear the song of birds under any circumstances, without feeling my spirits raised, my heart gladdened, and filled with delightful emotions. It is not so much the song itself, as the thousand associations of time, place, and circumstances, which are at once conjured up: it brings the verdant meadow, the blossomed hedgerow, or the softened sunbeams playing through the leafy trees, with the happy, gleeful days long gone by. I know not how it is, but on looking back on days past and gone, in which, at the time, sorrow was at least as prominent as joy, they seem stripped of all that was painful, and the pleasing and happy circumstances connected with them seem to stand out in bold relief, and give the prevailing hue to the picture. In this case, too, " 'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view, And clothes the mountain in its azure hue.". Naturalist 83

The American Goldfinch, the "Yellow Bird" was certainly one of the most widely noted bird species in the ornithological literature of New France and Quebec. In his passage on this bird and other colourful birds one can appreciate why this was the case:

Father: His appearance is now very beautiful and striking; the body being of a rich yellow, with the front of the head, wings, and tail of a deep black; and as they are by no means solitary, but fly in flocks, they cannot fail of being noticed by the most unobservant!

Gosse's discussion of the Ruby-throated Hummingbird manages to provide a description of this bird without the dry renderings so often given; he also manages to include contemporary knowledge about its range in Canada as well as introduce the Rufus Hummingbird:

Father: See how they hover on the wing, in front of the blossoms, quite stationary, while their long tongue is inserted, but their wings vibrating so rapidly as to be only visible as an indistinct cloud on each side. C. One of them has suddenly vanished, but I did not see him fly, though I was watching him. F. He has gone only about a yard : you may see him stationary again to the right of where he was before. These starts are so sudden and so rapid, that they are often lost to the sight.

Son: How very little and how very beautiful! the body glitters in the sun with green and gold, and the throat is just like a glowing coal of fire. Now they rest on a twig; one of them I perceive has not the brilliant throat of the other.

Father: That is the female; in other respects her plumage is like that of the male. It is the Ruby-throated Hummingbird (Trochilus Colubris), and is scattered over the whole of this continent, at least to the latitude of 57 degrees north. It is the only species of the genus found in North America, except a species (T. Rufus) which inhabits the coast of the Pacific, as far north as 61.

Son: Is it numerous here?

Father: Yes: in summer it is abundant; frequenting our gardens, for the tubular flowers, which it probes with its long bill and tongue, sometimes hiding its head in the corolla, and sucking with so much indiscretion as to be approached, and taken in the hand. It is particularly fond of the deep crimson flowers of the sweet-smelling Balm (Monarda Kalmiana), and will return to these after a few moments....

It is evident from comments by contemporary naturalists that the writing and ornithological talents of Philip Henry Gosse are now held in high esteem. This fact is largely due to his writings about Jamaican birds after he left Canada. One can only speculate what might have been if Gosse had remained in Canada and wrote about Canadian ornithology. He was certainly familiar with the contemporary American ornithologists such as Alexander Wilson, Charles Lucien Bonaparte and Thomas Nuttall. Naturalist is replete with their comments on birds Gosse discusses.

Gosse was also well connected to both the Montreal and Quebec naturalist community as well as with the British natural history community. Prior to the 1860s, with the published writings of Archibald Hall in Quebec and Thomas McIlwraith in Ontario, the great hole which existed in the ornithologists knowledge of these two provinces was finally filled. Elsewhere, the publishing of John Richardson's Fauna Boreali Americana, Volume 2, The Birds, in 1831, resulted in the fact that the ornithology of the rest of Canada was remarkably well known.

Gosse used some of his own illustrations such as that of the American Bittern; in answer to a question as to the identity of this bird:

Father:  It is the Indian Hen, or American Bittern (Ardea Minor). It looks very small; but when     its wings are extended, it measures nearly three feet and a half from tip to tip, and three feet    from the bill to the toes: it is, however, of a slender form; the neck and legs being long, but the     body small. The head is remarkably flattened, and gives the bird a very singular appearance:    the feathers of the neck are long and loose, and capable of being erected : the general colour is   dark brown, spotted with yellow, on the back; and yellowish, spotted with brown, on the belly.

Gosse's discussion of the Canada Jay in the Eastern Townships in 1835 provides some interesting reading:

The Canada Jay (Corvus Canadensis) is quite numerous now: it appears with us about the middle of October, hopping about in fields and pastures, and at the margins of woods. Wilson appears to have had a very slight acquaintance with this species; it is by no means a bird of solitary habits, almost always appearing in parties of three or four: neither does it, with us, confine itself to "unfrequented shaded retreats", as his informant reports, but, on the contrary, seems to be a saucy, familiar, fearless bird, often coming about the house, and playing about till one gets very near it. In Newfoundland, where they are common, they live in the woods, but are very often found in the paths, feeding on the crumbs of bread, droppings, &c. which are met with in frequented places. A winter or two ago, there were several Canada jays that used to come and play about some fir trees on the banks of the Masuippi, close to a village school, unterrified by the uproar of the boisterous boys.

After 180 years the Canadian Naturalist still provides some interesting reading to the Canadian naturalist and ornithologist. It provides insight into which trees were used for furniture, implements and firewood and explains why one occasionally hears trees cracking in the wintertime.

It is evident that while in Canada Gosse still had a strong interest in entomology but he was developing a wide interest in all facets of natural history. In addition to birds and insects his numerous mammal observations are interesting and sometimes significant including one of the few records of the Eastern Cougar. The following is a passage from Naturalist 39:

I have heard both Nathan and Amos Merrill speak of a large cat, which was killed in the township of Bolton, about fifteen years ago, and which they call a Catamount, but which from the description they give of it, I believe to have been no other than the Puma (Felis Concolor of Linnaeus). A man was going into the woods with his axe, when he was met by another man, who having just been alarmed by the sight of the animal in question, advised him not to go on. He however proceeded, and soon discovered the puma under the root of a fallen tree: [after a brief encounter the man returned with a rife and killed and stiffed it] ...Both of the Merrills have seen it many times, Amos having resided within three miles of the house: they describe it as being four or five feet in length, exclusive of the tail, which was two and a half or three feet; that it stood near three feet high, was in all respects a cat, with a round flattened face, large round paws, &c.; the colour was a dull red, without marks or spots. Supposing the dimensions given to be exaggerated, through defective memory, there can be no doubt that the animal in question was a puma....The species may possibly even yet be found, though rarely, in our almost interminable forests.

Gosse's report of an Eastern Cougar in the Eastern Townships of Quebec about 1820 is a significant record. Another sighting was recorded by Frederick Boxer in "Reminiscences of the survey and cutting out of the Boundary line between Canada and the United States from the spring of 1843 to the close of operations in the field, in the fall of 1845" This article was originally published in the LHSQ Transactions, Original Series, Vol. 4, No. 4 (1855). Along with the Cougar records of Charles Fothergill, from the Peterborough District of Ontario, there is little doubt that this illusive predator was present in southern Quebec and Ontario in the early 19th century.

Finally, the great 19th Century Quebec entomologist, William Couper, reviewed Gosse's insect records in The Canadian Naturalist in The Canadian Naturalist and Geologist 6: 217-219 (1861). Couper's review can be found here. Couper found many errors in the scientific names Gosse assigned to various species of Coleoptera and Lepidoptera, the most studied insects in Canadian entomology. This article shows the great progress that had been made in these fields in the short space of 20 years.

Bibliography

• Brown, Richard. 2010 Blogspot. The Eastern Townships. https://richardjohnbr.blogspot.com/2010/10/eastern-townships.html?m=1
• Couper, William. 1861. "Reviews and Notices of Books; The Canadian Naturalist"
• The Canadian Naturalist and Geologist 6: 217-219. Montreal: B. Dawson & Son
• Gosse, Edmund. 1907. Father and Son. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons
• Gosse, Philip Henry, 1840. The Canadian Naturalist. London: John Van Voorst
• Gould, S. J. 1985. The Flamingo's Smile, Some Reflections in Natural History. New York: W. W. Norton & Company
• Lack, David. 1976. Island Biology Illustrated by the Land Birds of Jamaica. Berkeley: University of California Press
• Stewart, David B in Keir Sterling et al edit; 1997. "Goose, Philip Henry". Biological Dictionary of American and Canadian Naturalists and Environmentalists. Westport Conn: Greenwood Press
• Thwaite, Ann (2002). Glimpses of the Wonderful: The Life of Philip Henry Gosse, 1810-1888. London: Faber & Faber