THE CORMORANT. 79 



rough, and the egg is similarly shaped at each end. In pro- 

 portion to the size of the bird, the egg is small. 



The bird feeds on fish, and, as already stated, is a skilful 

 and successful fisher. Its appetite is voracious, and it 

 not unfrequently pays a heavy penalty for its want of 

 discrimination. Several instances are recorded in which the 

 Cormorant has transfixed an eel with the lower mandible, 

 and, not being able to kill or disengage its prey, has been 

 strangled by the fish twining itself round its captor's 

 throat. 



Besides pursuing its food in the water the bird often 

 perches on rocks, posts, or overhanging boughs, where it 

 watches for stray aquatic wanderers that may pass. Any 

 such luckless fish is pursued and caught with unerring 

 certainty. 



Although generally speaking an oceanic bird, the 

 Cormorant is no stranger to fresh water ; rivers, lakes, 

 and ponds that are abundantly supplied with fish being 

 commonly resorted to. According to some naturalists, 

 the bird has been met with on the Chinese rivers a 

 thousand miles from the sea- shore. 



The length of the male bird is about three feet ; in the 

 spring and early summer the bill is pale brown, the point 

 horny, hooked, and sharp; irides green; forehead, crown, 

 nape and part of the neck black, mixed with many white, hair- 

 like feathers ; the black feathers on the back of the head 

 elongated, and forming a crest ; the back and wing coverts 

 dark brown, the feathers margined with black ; quill 

 feathers and tail black ; lower part of the neck all round, 

 with the breast and all the under-surface of the body, a 

 rich velvet-like bluish-black, except a patch on the thigh, 

 which is white ; the legs, toes, and membranes black. The 



