THE ZooLocist—JANUARY, 1875. 4275 
eggs is strongly tinged with green in some specimens, and these I have seen 
offered for sale as eggs of the goosander.”—P, 269. 
From the graphic account of the great northern diver, I make 
two very short extracts; the first rather anecdotical, but illustrating 
its great strength when submerged; the second illustrating its 
powers of flight. We have yet to learn the rationale of aérial 
progression in the auks and divers, and although I have spent time 
and attention galore on the guillemots at the Zoo, I am totally 
unable to explain how they fly when they do fly, and why they 
don’t fly when left at perfect liberty to do so with unmutilated 
wings; but I shall have a few more words to say on the elligog 
anon, and on the cormorant too. 
« A gentleman of my acquaintance having wounded a diver, arranged with 
his lad to get it alive into the boat, and then by means of a piece of stout line 
they made it fast by one leg to the stem and tossed it overboard. The poor 
bird instantly dived, and for many minutes steadily towed the boat seawards, 
remaining entirely submerged the whole time, except when it rose for a few 
seconds to breathe. During this extraordinary performance it made use of 
the wings as well as of the feet—of course being able to use only one of the 
latter freely. The boat was thirteen feet in the keel, but light for its size, 
being, like all those used in Shetland, built of Norway pine.”—P. 279. 
The second passage is this :— 
“Tt [the great northern diver] has been seen upon wing at all seasons, 
but so far as I have observed very rarely at any other than spring. It then 
often flies to a great height, circling over land and water in an undecided 
sort of manner, at intervals uttering loud hoarse screams. At such times it 
may easily be known by its long thick neck and by its short rapidly-beating 
wings. Indeed one cannot but feel surprised at the doubts which still exist 
in some quarters as to its power of flight. The wings being small and placed 
far back certainly give it a rather ungainly appearance in the air, but for all 
that the bird is able to fly vigorously and with considerable velocity. I have 
seen it on the wing in November flying up the voe at Balta Sound.”— 
P. 278. 
I have now reached the elligog, longie, or guillemot, the lomvia 
of the Danes, the langivie of the Faroese. This bird was the first 
sea-bird to which I was introduced, and well do I recollect the 
introduction: the ceremony took place under the cliffs at Fresh- 
water between three and four o’clock on a May morning, but when 
