STRUCTURE AND INSTINCTS. 363 



selves to be seized rather than quit their post. 

 The puffin, however, a round little bird, with 

 black and white plumage, and a parrot-shaped 

 bill, ribbed with orange, lays its single egg in a 

 burrow which it digs with its bill, if it is unable 

 to discover one already made by a rabbit, and 

 there for a month it sits with the utmost patience, 

 till the young puffin at length breaks the shell. 

 The structure of all these birds, their instincts 

 and their habits, are such- as illustrate in a most 

 striking manner the observations already made, 

 exhibiting in the evident correspondence sub- 

 sisting among them the obvious designs of Infinite 

 Wisdom. 



On this subject we must, however, content our- 

 selves with one illustration, furnished by the 

 structure of the gannet or solan goose. This 

 bird is very abundant on our northern shores, 

 and has various favourite breeding places in the 

 inaccessible precipices both on the eastern and 

 western coasts of Scotland. In seeking its appro- 

 priate food the gannet flies at no great distance 

 from the surface of the water, but on perceiving 

 a fish it immediately rises into the air, and de- 

 scends with extraordinary force upon its prey, 

 sometimes by the mere impulse of its descent 

 penetrating the waters to a depth of twenty or 

 even thirty fathoms. Incredible as this may 

 appear, it is certain that these birds have oc- 

 casionally been found in great numbers entangled 

 in the fishing nets sunk in the sea to the depths 

 now stated, having darted into the water in pur- 



