WATCHING SHAGS AND GUILLEMOTS 165 



power and evil, which may well have struck Milton, 

 as it must, I think, anyone who is appreciative and 

 either not an ornithologist or who, if he is one, will 

 suppress for the time being his special scientific 

 knowledge and se laisser prendre aux choses, as 

 did the less (falsely) critical portion of Moliere's 

 audiences. 



For, whatever the cormorant may look, he is in 

 reality — except from the fish's point of view, which 

 is, no doubt, a strong one — both a very innocent 

 and, as I have said, a very amiable bird. He shines 

 particularly in scenes of quiet domestic happiness — 

 in the home circle both giving and receiving affection 

 — and it is in this light that the following pictures 

 will for the most part reveal him. I must premise 

 that they all refer to that smaller and handsomer 

 species of our two cormorants adorned with a crest, 

 and whose plumage is all of a deep glossy, glancing 

 green, called the shag. If I speak of him sometimes 

 by his family name, it is because he has a clear right 

 to it, and also because it has a more pleasing sound 

 than the one which distinguishes him specifically. The 

 habits of the two birds are almost the same, if not 

 quite identical. They fish together in the sea, stand 

 together on the rocks, and in the earlier stages of 

 its plumage the more ornate one closely resembles 

 the other in its permanent dress. One might think 

 that they were not merely the co-descendants of a 

 common and now extinct ancestor, but the modified 

 form and its actual living progenitor. But I am 

 aware of the arguments which could be used against 

 such a conclusion. 



I will now give my observations as taken down 



