WATER FOWL. 371 



die toe being toothed or notched, like a saw, to 

 assist it in holding its fishy prey. The head and 

 neck of this bird are of a sooty blackness ; and 

 the body thick and heavy, more inclining in figure 

 to that of the goose than the gull. The bill is 

 straight till near the end, where the upper chap 

 bends into a hook. 



But notwithstanding the seeming heaviness of 

 its make, there are few birds more powerfully pre- 

 daceous. As soon as the winter approaches, they 

 are seen dispersed along the sea-shore, and ascend- 

 ing up the mouths of fresh water rivers, carrying 

 destruction to all the finny tribe. They are most 

 remarkably voracious, and have a most sudden 

 digestion. Their appetite is for ever craving, and 

 never satisfied. This gnawing sensation may pro- 

 bably be increased by the great quantity of small 

 worms that fill their intestines, and which their 

 unceasing gluttony contributes to engender. 



Thus formed with grossest appetites, this un- 

 clean bird has the most rank and disagreeable 

 smell, and is more fetid than even carrion, when 

 in its most healthful state. Its form, says an 

 ingenious modern, is disagreeable ; its voice is 

 hoarse and croaking ; and all its qualities obscene. 

 No wonder then that Milton should make Satan 

 personate this bird, when he sent him upon the 

 basest purposes, to survey with pain the beauties 

 of Paradise, and to sit devising death on the tree 

 of life.* It has been remarked, however, of our 

 poet, that the making a water fowl perch upon a 



* Vide Pennant's Zoology, p. 477. 



