THE CORMORANT, 419 



half their weight, a Cormorant weighing from six to 

 seven pounds. What should we say of a man eating 

 seventy or eighty pounds of beef or mutton at his daily 

 meals ? which he would do were his appetite as great in 

 proportion as that of the Cormorant's. The fact is, 

 that, like most birds living on fish, its digestion i& 

 extremely rapid, and it therefore requires a proportion- 

 ably larger supply of food, of which if it is deprived it- 

 soon dies, as is often known to be the ease. Thus, on 

 the western coast of the Hebrides, these poor birds suffer 

 severely, when, during and after a continued gale, tho 

 Atlantic rolls in its enormous billows, dashing them 

 against the headlands, and scouring with their fury the 

 sounds and creeks. As far as the eye can reach, the 

 ocean boils and heaves, presenting one boundless field of 

 foam, the spray from the summits of the waves sweeping 

 along the waste like drifted snow : no sign of life is to 

 be seen, save when a Gull, labouring hard' to bear itself 

 up against the blast, hovers overhead, or darts by like 

 a meteor. If, at such a season, the haunts of the Cor- 

 morants are visited, they will be found huddled together 

 in their caves and crevices, perishing with hunger, and 

 their numbers daily thinning by death. If, indeed, they 

 could venture out, and bear the buffeting of the storm, 

 they would still fail in procuring food; for, as in fishing, 

 these birds always carry their heads under water, in order 

 that, with their keen, clear, and beautiful eye, they may 

 discover their prey at a greater distance, it is obvious 

 that in such commotions of the air and water, they would 

 need even a quicker glance than they possess. The use 

 they make of their bills in feeding shows remarkable 

 ingenuity, as well as agility: if the fish happens to be a 

 flat one, a flounder for instance, they will turn it,, so as 

 to place it in the most commodious position for slipping 

 down the throat; if, on the contrary, it happens to be 

 an eel, which has been seized in an unfavourable position 

 for gorging, they will throw it up, as a cook does a pan- 

 cake, and catch it in the fall. 



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