THE CORMOHANT. 
323 
most of them very voracious. The Chinese employ a species 
to assist them in fishings which they train and find very 
tractable. Mr. Adams^ during the voyage of the ^Samarang/ 
was struck with the habits of the Cape species (P. Africanus), 
This bird is very sociable, and unites with its kindred in 
forming large fishing parties. ^^They wind their way/^ 
says Mr. Adams, ^^in single file, starting from the rocks 
along the shore, then swimming in the tranquil waters of 
the bays, invariably led on by some experienced and sagacious 
old admiral, they commence their fishing. When their pilot 
spies a shoal of fish, he suddenly makes a vault out of the 
water, arching his neck, bending his body, and drawing up 
his legs, when, diving headlong down, he is followed imme- 
diately by all his anxious adherents, who perform their 
summersets in precisely the same manner. The flotilla re- 
mains submerged some little time, when it rises once more 
to the surface, and the feathered fishers again renew their 
diving and plunging piscatory evolutions.''^ He describes 
the cormorants as forming quite a peculiar feature in the 
coast scenery of the Cape. When seated on the rocks up- 
right and motionless, they remind you of some magisterial 
assembly in their sable robes, met together in grave and 
earnest conclave/^ 
