THE COMMON CORMORANT. 31 



And ill the calm or loune widdir is sene, 



Aboue the fludis hie, aiie fai-e plane greiie, 



Aiie standying-place quhar Skartis with thare bekkis, 



For gaiie the son gladly thaym prunyeis and bekis. 



Mr. Hardy has noticed that when the assemblages of 

 Cormorants on Craig Taw, a black rock off Siccar Point, are 

 larger than usual, say from twenty to thirty birds, they 

 betoken wet, stormy weather.^ 



The screaming of sea birds and their approach to the 

 shore seem to have been looked upon from very ancient 

 times as signs of a gathering storm, for we find Virgil in 

 his Georgics alluding to these propensities in the following 

 descriptive lines : — 



Jam sibi turn curvis male temperat unda carinis ; 

 Quum medio celeres revolant ex ;cqnore mergi, 

 Clamoremque ferunt ad littora. 



In a recent and more prosaic age we have Bailie Jarvie 

 saying nearly the same thing, but in other words : " Thae 

 women at Aberfoil are like the scarts or sea-maws at the 

 Cumries, there's aye foul weather follows their skirling." ^ 



The Cormorant is very wary and difficult to stalk. Its 

 flight is generally low over the surface of the water, with 

 rapid beats of the wings, and is often continued for a con- 

 siderable distance in a straight line. It feeds almost wholly 

 on fish, and swims with surprising speed, while it pursues 

 its finny prey under water with great agility and pertinacity, 

 displaying such skill in their capture that it has from time 

 immemorial been tamed in China and Japan and trained 

 to catch fish. Mr. J. E. Harting, in his Ornithology of 

 Shakespeare, says that James I. kept trained Cormorants for 

 many years, and was accustomed to travel about the country 

 with them, fishing wherever he went. He mentions that on 



1 "1874, October 16<A.— Twenty-three Cormorants at Siocar. I have noticed 

 that these assemblages betoken bad weather." — Hist. Der. Nat. Club, vol. vii. p. 281. 



2 Sir Walter Scott, Rob Roy. 



