WATER BIRDS 



line abreast or one behind the other, or the 

 flock may even assume the typical V shape 

 which is supposed to belong only to flocks of 

 ducks and geese. On the water they look like 

 loons, except for their blackness, and they are 

 most expert in diving and catching fish. Occa- 

 sionally they alight on the beach, where their 

 attitudes and motions may be watched and 

 their footprints examined. One pair in rising 

 into the air made five hops before they could 

 clear the beach, a distance of four yards. An- 

 other bird, with a stronger wind to help him, 

 pushed the beach back only three times. 



Wood in his '' New England Prospect," 

 written in 1634, says of these birds: " Cor- 

 morants bee as common as other f owles, which 

 destroy abundance of small fish . . . they 

 used to roost upon the tops of trees, and 

 rockes, being a very heavy, drowsie creature, 

 so that the Indians will go in their Cannowes 

 in the night, and take them from the Rocks, 

 as easily as women take a Hen from roost." 

 Old Josselyn, however, says: '' I cannot com- 

 mend them to our curious palats." I have 

 ventured so far as to eat their eggs, but that 

 was in Labrador. 



In thick stormy weather Mother Carey's 

 139 



