108 SIGNS AND SEASONS 



up, or to use his feet and legs for other purposes 

 than swimming. Indeed, he cannot stand except 

 upon his tail in a perpendicular attitude ; but in the 

 collections he is poised upon his feet like a barn- 

 yard fowl, all the wildness and grace and alertness 

 gone out of him. My specimen sits upon a table 

 as upon the surface of the water, his feet trailing 

 behind him, his body low and trim, his head ele- 

 vated and slightly turned as if in the act of bring- 

 ing that fiery eye to bear upon you, and vigilance 

 and power stamped upon every lineament. 



The loon is to the fishes what the hawk is to the 

 birds; he swoops down to unknown depths upon 

 them, and not even the wary trout can elude him. 

 Uncle Nathan said he had seen the loon disappear, 

 and in a moment come up with a large trout, which 

 he would cut in two with his strong beak and 

 swallow piecemeal. Neither the loon nor the otter 

 can bolt a fish under the water; he must come to 

 the surface to dispose of it. (I once saw a man eat 

 a cake under water in London.) Our guide told 

 me he had seen the parent loon swimming with a 

 single young one upon its back. When closely 

 pressed, it dived, or "div," as he would have it, 

 and left the young bird sitting upon the water. 

 Then it too disappeared, and when the old one 

 returned and called it came out from the shore. 

 On the wing overhead the loon looks not unlike 

 a very large duck, but when it alights it plows 

 into the water like a bombshell. It probably can- 

 not take flight from the land, as the one Gilbert 



