SHAG 361 



sional sailings of the wing." ..." The impetus of its flight is very great." 

 . . . "It never fishes, as some have said, from the air, by suddenly 

 darting into the water" (Blake Knox, Zoologist, 1866). 



Its voracity is as great as that of the cormorant, but it is 

 apparently not true that it gets gorged to such an extent that it can be 

 caught by hand. " A fish from two or three inches in width can be 

 swallowed by them, and an eel of two feet long is worked down by 

 degrees entire ; six full-sixed herrings are managed at a time, the 

 throat being capable of great distension." 



The following is the sex display of the shag as described by Mr. E. 

 Selous : a 



" The way in which the male (green) cormorant makes love to the 

 female is as follows : Either at once from where he stands, or after first 

 waddling a step or two, he makes an impressive hop or jump towards her, 

 and stretching his long neck straight up, or even a little backwards, he 

 at the same time throws back his head so that it is in one line with it, 

 and opens his beak rather widely. In a second or so he closes it, and 

 then he opens and shuts it again several times in succession, rather 

 more quickly. Then he sinks forward with his breast on the rock, so 

 that he lies all along it, and fanning out his small stiff tail, bends it 

 over his back whilst at the same time stretching his head and neck 

 backwards towards it, till with his beak he sometimes seizes and 

 apparently plays with the feathers. In this attitude he may remain for 

 some seconds more or less, having all the while a languishing or 

 ecstatic expression, after which he brings his head forward again, and 

 then repeats the performance some three or four or perhaps half a 

 dozen times. This would seem to be the full courting display, the com- 

 plete figure so to speak, but it is not always fully gone through. It 

 may be acted part at a time. The first part, commencing with the 

 hop the simple aveu as it may be called is not always followed by the 

 ecstasy in the recumbent posture, and the last is still more often in- 

 dulged in without this preliminary, whilst the bird is sitting thus upon 



1 Bird Watching, p. 166. 



