68 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



would open their mouths and void the contents of their crops, as I have 

 seen young Herons do ; in fact, after a stay of ten minutes, I was glad to 

 get off again. The wind had freshened a good deal since 1 started, and I 

 had some difficulty in making land : by the time I got to shore the cot was 

 nearly full of water, and most of the eggs, which were lying loose in the 

 bottom, were broken ; however, I brought home a dozen or so. On a later 

 visit I had a terrier dog with me, and he seemed so anxious to attack the 

 Cormorants that I took a young bird, about half-fledged, from the top of the 

 still, and put it into the water to let the dog have a swim after it ; but to 

 my great surprise, though the bird could never have been in the water 

 before, it dived away with great rapidity, not leaving the terrier the least 

 chance of catching it. The year following my raid a young man commenced 

 to cultivate the island again, and he drove off the Cormorants by lying out 

 in the evening when they were coming in from the sea, and shooting 

 at them : so they deserted the place ; but I was told that this year, 1881, 

 a few pairs again built their nests on the island. The peasants living on 

 the bank of the lake informed mc that the number of fish, which are chiefly 

 pike and perch, had much diminished since the Cormorants took up their 

 residence there. I saw myself a large drove of the birds swimming along 

 in a close body, and here and there I saw one dive, and then another, so that 

 no doubt the fish had a hard time of it. — J. J. Ffolliott Darling 

 (Ballina, Co. Mayo). 



The Nostrils of the Cormorant. — Having had my attention directed 

 by Mr. Romanes to the fact that Cormorants during a long flight, and for 

 some time after roosting, hold their heads agape as if panting, and it having 

 been suggested by him that this fact is presumably due to a remarkable 

 condition of the nostril which he had observed, I undertook an anatomical 

 investigation of the latter point, with the following results : — The external 

 nostril in Phalacrocorax carlo is a mere slit situated at the end of a shallow 

 superficial groove, which runs backwards along the beak parallel with its 

 lower edge, and lying between its lower and middle third. When a bristle 

 is introduced into the slit, it never succeeds in forcing a passage into the 

 nasal cavity. If the skin which forms the outer boundary of the slit is 

 carefully reflexed, a groove is exposed which runs from the external slit-like 

 nostril to a narrow canal lined apparently by modified mucous membrane. 

 This canal, when the mucous membrane remains, is externally from H to 

 2 millims. in diameter; but it rapidly diminishes, and appears to end 

 blindly. In all the specimens examined, however, when the skin has been 

 reflexed, it is possible to pass through this canal, without forming a false 

 passage, a bristle about the size of an ordinary horse-hair — i. e. less than 

 1 niillim. in diameter. The bristle is more easily passed in young birds 

 than in old ones : this seems to be due to the osseous canal being relatively 

 larger than in the former. Almost immediately beyond this narrow passage 



