104 COPPERSMITH—-CORMORANT 
organized chasses of the lakes near the coast of Languedoc and Pro- 
vence, of which an excellent description is given by the Vicomte 
Louis de Dax.! The flesh of the Coot is very variously regarded as 
food. To prepare the bird for the table, the feathers should be 
stripped, and the down, which is very close, thick, and hard to 
pluck, be rubbed with powdered resin; the body is then to. be 
dipped in boiling water, which melting the resin causes it to mix 
with the down, and then both can be removed together with 
tolerable ease. After this the bird should be left to soak for the 
night in cold spring-water, which will make it look as white and 
delicate as a chicken. Without this process the skin after roasting 
is found to be very oily, with a fishy flavour, and if the skin be 
taken off the flesh becomes dry and good for nothing (Hawker’s 
Instructions to Young Sportsmen; Hele’s Notes about Aldeburgh). 
The Coot is found throughout the Paleearctic area from Iceland 
to Japan, and in most other parts of the world is represented by 
nearly allied species, having almost the same habits. An African 
species (F. cristata), easily distinguished by a red caruncle on its 
forehead, is of rare appearance in the south of Europe. The 
Australian and North American species (f. australis and J. ameri- 
cana) have very great resemblance to our own bird; but in South 
America half a dozen or more additional species are found which 
range to Patagonia, and vary much in size, one (/. gigantea) being 
of considerable magnitude. The remains of another large species 
have been described by Prof. A. Milne-Edwards (Ann. Sc. Nat. ser. 
5, Zool. viii. pp. 194-220, pls. 10-13) from Mauritius, where it must 
have been a contemporary of the Dodo, but like that bird is now 
extinct. 
COPPERSMITH, see BARBET. 
CORACOID (named after the coracoid process on the human 
shoulder-blade, which was likened in shape by medieval anatomists 
to a Raven’s bill) one of a pair of strong bones which connect the 
anterior or basal margin of the sternum with the scapula and 
clavicle, and form the chief articulation of the humerus with the 
shoulder-girdle (see SKELETON). 
CORACOMORPH Ai, Prof. Huxley’s name for the large group 
of HSBounatHous birds—incomparably the largest of those that 
now exist, and for the most part equivalent to the PASsERES of 
Linneus and Cuvier, and wholly to the VoLucreEs of Sundevall 
(Proc. Zool. Soc. 1867, pp. 468-472). (See INTRODUCTION.) 
CORMORANT?—from the Latin corvus marinus, through the 
1 “Tia Volée aux Macreuses.” Nowveaux Souvenirs de Chasse et de la Péche 
dans le midi de la France, pp. 53-65. Paris: 1860. 
2 Some authors, following Caius, derive the word from corvus vorans and 
spell it Corvorant, but doubtless wrongly. 
