CORMORANT 105 
French (in some patois, of which it is still “cor marin,” and in 
certain Italian dialects “corvo marin” or ‘“corvo marino”)—a 
large sea-fowl belonging to the genus Phalacrocorax! (Carbo, Halieus, 
and Graculus of some ornithologists), and that group of the Linnean 
Order Anseres, now pretty generally recognized by Illiger’s term 
STEGANOPODES, of which it with its allies forms a Family Phalacro- 
coracidx. 
The Cormorant, P. carbo, frequents almost all the sea-coast of 
Kurope, and breeds in societies at various stations most generally 
on steep cliffs, but occasionally 
on rocky islands as well as on 
trees. The nest consists of a 
large mass of seaweed, and, 
with the ground immediately 
surrounding it, generally looks 
as though bespattered with 
whitewash, from the excrement 
of the bird, which lives entirely on fish. The eggs, from four to six 
in number, are small, and have a thick, soft, calcareous shell, bluish- 
white when first laid, but soon becoming discoloured. The young 
are hatched blind, and covered with an inky-black skin. They 
remain for some time in the squab-condition, and are then highly 
esteemed for food by the northern islanders, their flesh being said 
to taste as well as a roasted hare’s. Their first plumage is of a 
sombre brownish-black above, and more or less white beneath. 
They take two or three years to assume the fully adult dress, 
which is deep black, glossed above with bronze, and varied in 
the breeding-season with white on the cheeks and flanks, besides 
being adorned by filamentary feathers on the head, and further 
set off by a bright yellow gape. The old Cormorant looks as big 
as a Goose, but is really much smaller: its flesh is quite uneatable. 
Taken when young from the nest, this bird is easily tamed, 
‘and can be trained to fish for its keeper, as was of old time com- 
monly done in England, where the Master of the Cormorants was 
one of the officers of the royal household. Nowadays the practice 
is nearly disused, though a few gentlemen still follow it for their 
diversion. When taken out to furnish sport, a strap is fastened 
round the bird’s neck so as, without impeding its breath, to hinder 
it from swallowing its captures.2 Arrived at the waterside, it is 
cast off. It at once dives and darts along the bottom as swiftly as 
Cormorant. (After Swainson.) 
1 So spelt since the days of Gesner ; but possibly Phalarocorax would be more 
correct. 
2 It was formerly the custom, as we learn from Willughby, to carry the 
Cormorant hooded till its services were required, by which means it was kept 
quiet. At the present time its bearer wears a wire-mask to protect his eyes and 
face from the bird’s beak. 
