Birds. 975 



son, of course I had no means of ascertaining; but as the circumstan- 

 ces under which he came ashore were somewhat curious, I will proceed 

 to relate them. It was in the year 1839, on, as I have already inti- 

 mated, April 24, when some fishermen observed floating off Steephill 

 Cove, what at first they took for a cask of spirits ; nearer inspection 

 showed it to be one of those handsome fellows which rejoice in the 

 various significant appellations of fishing-frog, sea-devil and wide-gab, 

 but which, for accuracy's sake, I will denominate scientifically, Lo- 

 phius piscatorius. What brought this said handsome fellow to the 

 surface, and kept him there, was matter of surprise to the fishermen, 

 till having very unceremoniously, by means of their boat-hook, hauled 

 him on board, they discovered, protruding from his throat into his ca- 

 vern of a mouth, the head of a red-throated diver ; the body of the 

 bird being entombed in lower regions. How he got there, it is not 

 easy to guess : whether he was napping on the surface, and so was 

 caught by Master Lophius ; or whether, during a submarine excur- 

 sion, he blundered within his capacious jaws ; seems almost equally 

 improbable. There he was, however ; and what is more, all alive and 

 kicking, so soon as one of the men afforded him room to kick, by pull- 

 ing him out of the stomach : for no sooner was he extricated from his 

 perilous position, and found room for play in the mouth of his captor, 

 than he attacked most furiously the interior with his formidable beak, 

 to the sharpness and strength of which I can speak most positively, 

 from experience thereof. The fish was nearly dead, either choked by 

 the Tartar he had caught, or rendered so specifically light by the mass 

 of feathers he had gorged as to be unable to descend to the bottom, 

 where he is said more commonly to reside. Both fish and bird were 

 purchased by my friend J. B. Martin, Esq., and presented by him, the 

 fish to the College of Surgeons, and the bird to the Zoological Soci- 

 ety. On enquiring at the gardens for my old acquaintance in the 

 course of the following year, I was informed he lived there only six 

 months. 



The common Guillemot abounds both in summer and winter; and 

 breeds in considerable numbers in the Freshwater cliffs. I believe it 

 to be correct that this bird and the razor-bill do carry their young from 

 the ledge of the cliff on which they were hatched, down to the sea, on 

 their backs. They then proceed out to sea, pass the summer in mid- 

 channel, and, as winter approaches, are frequently seen in-shore. 



The Little Auk I give on the authority of Mr. Butler, who has ob- 

 tained it occasionally. I have, however, seen pass my boat, two or 

 three times, a little bird for which I can find no other name. 



