38 BIRDS OF ICELAND 



The Gannet, as most people know, is of a creamy 

 white with black wing-primaries : it is about 34 inches 

 in length, wing 19 inches. The young are sooty with 

 white spots, and grow gradually lighter in colour till 

 their sixth year, when they are adult. 



The food of the Gannet consists of surface-swimminc^ 

 fish (herring, for choice) which it spies when circling 

 at a considerable height in the air, and, closing its 

 wings, hurls itself headlong upon, dashing up the water 

 on contact and cjoinsj some distance below the surface. 

 I believe, having once watched for some time a number 

 of these birds feeding about a hundred yards from 

 where I was anchored in a small boat, that they seldom 

 miss their aim. By calling attention to the exact 

 locality of a shoal of herrings, they often render an 

 unintentional service to fishing smacks on the look- 

 out, quite compensating man (who considers he has a 

 sort of proprietary right in everything everywhere), 

 for the toll or tithe they themselves take of the shoal 

 of herrini^^s. 



Ardea cinerea, Linn. HEnoisr. 



Native name : ' Hegjri.' 



On this bird Herra Grondal remarks (Isl. Vogeln. 

 p. 594), that its name is universally known, though the 



