PHALA CROCOEA CIB^ : CORMORANTS. 



723 



with light and dark colors, much tinged in places with carmine ; eyes white ; bare space around 

 them blue ; eyelids red ; pouch blackish ; feet black. Plumage dark and much variegated. 

 Head mostly white, tinged with yellow on top, the white extending down the neck as a border- 

 ing of the pouch and somewhat beyond ; rest of neck dark chestnut. Upper parts dusky, each 

 feather pale or whitish-ceutred, the paler gray color prevailing on the wiug-coverts. Prima- 

 ries blackish, their shafts basally white ; secondaries dark, pale-edged ; tail-feathers gray. 

 Lower parts grayish-brown, striped with white on the sides ; the lower fore-neck varied with 

 yellow, chestnut, and blackish. ? said to lack the chestnut coloring of the neck (?) Length 

 about 4.50 feet ; extent 6.50 feet; wing 2 feet ; bill a foot or more, the gular pouch extending 

 about the same distance along the neck. Tail 7.00, 22-feathered ; tarsus 2.50; middle toe and 

 claw 4.50. The bill and soft parts very variable in color with age or other circumstance. Young 

 lack the special coloration of tlie neck, M-hicVi is simply dark brown. At first, covered with 

 whitislr down. The featliers of the neck of the adult are peculiarly soft and downy ; there is 

 a slight nuchal crest, with stiff bristly feathers on the forehead, and lengthened acute feathers 

 on the lower foreneck and breast. The brown pelican is exclusively maritime, inhabiting both 

 coasts of America from tropical regions to Carolina and California. It plunges for its prey like 

 a gannet, not scooping it up swimming like the white pelican. Breeds in colonies, indiffer- 

 ently on the ground or on bushes and low trees. Eggs 2-.3, white, chalky, elliptical, 3.00 X 

 2.00. 



55. Family PHALACROCORACID^: : Cormorants. 



Bill about as long as head, stout 



or slender, more or less nearly terete, 



always strongly hooked at the end ; 



tomia generally found irregularly 



jagged, but not truly serrate ; a long, 



narrtiw, nasal grocjve, but nostrils 



obliterated in tlie adult state; gape 



reaching below the eyes, which are set in naked skin. 



Gular poueli small, but forming an evident naked space 



under the bill and on the ihruat, variously encroached 



upon by the feathers. Wiugs short for the order, stiff 



and strong, the 2d primary usually longer than the .'id, 



both these exceeding the 1st. Tail rather long, large, 



ire or less fan-shaped, of 12-14 very stiff, strong 



feathers, denuded to the base by extreme shortness of 



the coverts; thus almfist "scansorial" in structure, 



recalling that of a woodpecker or creeper, and used in a 



siuiilur way, as a support in standing, or an aid in 



scrambling over rocks and bushes. The body is cora- 



jjact and heavy, with a long sinuous necls;; the general 



configuration, and especially the far backward set of the 



is much like that of pygopodous birds. While other Steganopodes can stand with the 



Fig. 502. — Knee-joint of Phalacrocorax 

 bicristatus, nat. size, from nature by Dr. E. 

 W. Sliufeldt. F, femur; P, patella; T, tibia; 

 Fb, libula. 



lea 



body more or less nearly approaching a horizontal position, the cormorants are forced into a 

 nearly upright posture, when the tail affords with the feet a tripod of support. They also, like 

 the birds just mentioned, dive and swim under water in pursuit of their prey, using their wint^s 

 for submarine progression, which is not the case with the other families, excepting Plotida:. 

 In both these families the body is not in the least pneumatic under the skin — quite the reverse 

 of Pelicans and Gannets. 



Among osteological characters, aside from the general figure of the skeleton, a long bony 



