66 ON THE BEACH AT DAYTONA. 
over the draw, which just then stood open 
for the passage of a tug-boat. The toll- 
gatherer told me they had come “ from some 
place” eight or ten days before. His atten- 
tion had been called to them by his cat, who 
was trying to get up to the box to bid them 
welcome. He believed that she discovered 
them within three minutes of their arrival. 
It seemed not unlikely. In its own way a 
cat is a pretty sharp ornithologist. 
One or two cormorants were almost al- 
ways about the river. Sometimes they sat 
upon stakes in a patriotic, spread - eagle 
(American eagle) attitude, as if drying 
their wings,—a curious sight till one be- 
came accustomed to it. Snakebirds and 
buzzards resort to the same device, but I 
cannot recall ever seeing any Northern bird 
thus engaged. From the south bridge I one 
morning saw, to my great satisfaction, a 
couple of white pelicans, the only ones that 
I found in Florida, though I was assured 
that within twenty years they had been com- 
mon along the Halifax and Hillsborough 
rivers. My birds were flying up the river 
at a good height. The brown pelicans, on 
the other hand, made their daily pilgrimages 
