UNDER THE MAPLES 



face, and only at intervals beating the air for more 

 power. They are heavy, awkward-looking birds 

 with wings and forms that suggest none of the 

 grace and beauty of the usual shore birds. They 

 do not seem to be formed to cleave the air, or to 

 part the water, but they do both very successfully. 

 When the pelican dives for his prey, he is for the 

 moment transformed into a thunderbolt. He comes 

 down like an arrow of Jove, and smites and parts 

 the water in surperb style. When he recovers 

 himself, he is the same stolid, awkward-looking 

 creature as before. 



A bird evidently not far removed from its rep- 

 tilian ancestors — a bird that is at home under the 

 water and hunts its prey there on the wing — is the 

 black cormorant. There is a colony of several hun- 

 dred of them on the face of a sea-cliff a short 

 distance above me. 



I see, at nearly all hours of the day, the black 

 lines they make above the foaming breakers as 

 they go and come on their foraging expeditions. 

 In diving, they disappear under the water like 

 the loon, and penetrate to as great depths. One 

 does not crave an intimate acquaintance with 

 them, but they are interesting as a part of the 

 multitudinous life of the shore. 



III. SILKEN CHAMBERS 



The trap-door spider has furnished me with 



132 



