328 NATURALIST'S CABINET. 



Skirmishes of the booby and frigate ; 



which it instantly seizes and swallows. Catesby 

 thus describes the skirmishes of the booby and 

 its enemy, which he calls the pirate. " The lat- 

 ter/' he says, " subsists entirely on the spoils of 

 others, and particularly of the booby. As soon 

 as the pirate perceives that it has caught a fish, 

 he flies furiously against it, and obliges it to dive 

 under water for safety; the pirate not being able 

 to follow it, hovers above the water till the booby 

 is obliged to emerge for respiration, and thea 

 attacks it again while spent and breathless, and 

 compels it to surrender its fish: it now returns 

 to its labours, and has to suffer fresh attacks 

 from its enemy." 



Leguat says, the boobies repair at night to 

 fepose on the island of Rodrigue ; and the fri- 

 gate waits for them on the tops of the trees ; it 

 rises very high, and darts down upon them like 

 a hawk upon his prey, not to kill them, but to 

 make them disgorge. The booby, struck in this 

 way by the frigate, throws up a fish, which the 

 latter snatches in the air : often the booby 

 screams, and discovers a reluctance to part with 

 its booty; but the frigate scorns its cries, and 

 rising again, descends with such a blow as to 

 stun the poor bird, and compel an immediate 

 surrender. 



Dampier gives us a curious account of the 

 hostililies between the man-of-war birds, and the 

 boobies, in the Alcrane Islands, on the coast of 



