162 THE CORMORANT. 



straining violently, with repeated efforts to gulp it ; 

 and when you fancy that the slippery mouthful is 

 successfully disposed of, all on a sudden the eel 

 retrogrades upwards from its dismal sepulchre, strug- 

 gling violently to escape. The cormorant swallows 

 it again ; and up again it comes, and shows its tail 

 a foot or more out of its destroyer's mouth. At 

 length, worn out with ineffectual writhings and 

 slidings, the eel is gulped down into the cormorant's 

 stomach for the last time, there to meet its dreaded 

 and inevitable fate. This gormandising exhibition 

 was witnessed here by several individuals, both 

 ladies and gentlemen, on Nov. 26. 1832, through an 

 excellent eight-and-twenty-guinea telescope ; the 

 cormorant being, at that time, not more than a 

 hundred yards distant from the observers. I was of 

 the party. 



When I visited Flamborough Head in the first 

 week in June, I was disappointed in not seeing the 

 cormorant there; but I was informed in Bridlington 

 Quay, that this bird was not to be found nearer than 

 the rocks at Buckton ; and that it had eggs very late 

 in the season. In consequence of this information, 

 I made a second expedition to the sea coast, and ar- 

 rived at Bridlington Quay on July 14. 1834. 



About three quarters of a mile from the sea, be- 

 twixt Flamborough Head and Filey Bay, stands the 

 once hospitable mansion of Buckton Hall. I say 

 hospitable, because its carved ornaments in stone, 

 its stately appearance, and the excellent manner in 

 which its out-buildings have been constructed, 

 plainly indicate that mirth and revelry must once 



