362 COMMON CORMORANT. 
This species is found in the Feeoes, Iceland, and Greenland up 
to about 70° N. lat. ; while it is generally distributed over Europe, 
and breeding-colonies are to be found in situations widely different 
in character, such as ledges of cliffs, the swampy meres of Holland, 
and the inundated forests of the valley of the Danube. It is found 
all over Asia—-except in the high north—and usually nests on trees ; 
while in Australia and New Zealand the representative is a doubt- 
fully distinct form, P. xove-hollandie. Our bird is said to have 
occurred in South Africa, and is common in the north of that 
continent. In America it inhabits the Atlantic coast, from Hudson 
Bay to New Jersey, but it has not yet been noticed on the Pacific. 
The nest is a large structure composed of sticks and grass or water- 
plants, mixed, when near the coast, with masses of sea-weed ; the 
eggs, laid in this country in the latter half of April or in May, and 
3-5 in number, are oblong, rough in texture, and have a pale blue 
under-shell with a chalky-white coating: measurements 2°75 by 
16 in. Many birds usually congregate at the breeding-places, 
which, as already indicated, are to be found on high cliffs, low islets, 
bushes or trees. In 1882 a pair hatched two young in the 
Zoological Society Gardens, Regent’s Park, and it was observed that 
after the male had been fed and retained the fish for about an hour, 
he mounted the side of the nest and opened his capacious mouth, 
which the young bird entered as far as its outstretched wings would 
allow, and helped itself to the macerated food in the old one’s crop. 
The parents had been trained by Capt. F. H. Salvin for catching 
fish: a practice pursued as a sport in this country since the time of 
the Stuart sovereigns ; while, as a business, it has been followed in 
China and Japan from time immemorial. The nestlings are blind 
for a fortnight or more after being hatched. 
The adult has the upper head and neck black, with many hair- 
like white feathers, and those on the occiput lengthen and form a crest 
in spring ; throat white; gular pouch yellow ; mantle bronze-brown 
and black ; quills, and the tail of fourteen feathers, black ; under 
parts rich bluish-black, except a white patch on the thigh, which is 
assumed very early in spring and lost in summer ; irides emerald- 
green. The sexesare alike in plumage, but the male is larger, brighter 
in colour, and has the longer crest. Length about 36in.; wing 
14°5in. The young bird is dark brown above, dull white mottled 
with pale wood-brown below ; irides brown the first year, then pale 
bluish-green, changing to emerald at the end of the second year. 
There are records of varieties tending to albinism, and even of pure 
white birds with light-coloured bills and feet. 
