Page:Tourist's Maritime Provinces.djvu/190

150 the echoes moaning about the lake. What sound so grievous as a loon's complaint? Lampman has put into verse their legend:

The Indians attribute to these birds miraculous powers of prophecy and believe they give notice of a change in the weather by their scream. In the Micmac legend, The Loon Magician, many untoward things occur or are avoided through disobedience or obedience to the warning of a loon. In appearance, these great water-fowl are eerie as their cry. Their long white-feathered necks are wound with a band black and soft as ebony velvet. They live entirely on or under the water. They can stand erect only by using their tail "like the third leg of a tripod," and they cannot walk at all. Their wings they use under the water as in the air, to propel them forward. They are master divers and of all the creatures that live