PELECANINiE. PHALACROCORAX. 
223 
much inclined position, walk very little, fly with a moderately 
quick, sedate, and even flight, at a small height, are generally 
shy, and difficult to be shot, and form very large rude nests, 
of sticks and sea-weeds. The eggs, generally three, are oblong, 
two inches and eight-twelfths in length, and inch and three- 
fourths in breadth, with a thick roughish, bluish-white shell, 
thickly crusted with white calcareous matter. The young 
at first have the skin bare and dusky or dull livid, in a few 
days are covered with brownish-black down, and in about 
eight weeks are able to fly. For about six months, they have 
the nostrils open, and the middle claws entire. The flesh is 
dark-coloured and rank, and the eggs unfit for being eaten, 
as in all the Cormorants. 
White-spot Cormorant. White-headed Cormorant. Crest- 
ed Cormorant. Great Scart or Scarve. Coal Goose. 
Pelecanus Carbo, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. 216. — Pelecanus Car- 
bo, Lath. Ind. Ornith. ii. 886.- — Carbo Cormoranus, Temm. 
Man. d’ Ornith. ii. 894. — Phalacrocorax Carbo, Great Cormo- 
rant, MacGillivray, Brit. Birds, v. 
287. Phalacrocorax Graculus. Green Cormorant. 
Length about two feet and a quarter ; tail of twelve fea- 
thers ; imbricated feathers on the back ovate, rather acute, 
with velvety margins. Adult in winter crestless ; the plum- 
age glossy, blackish-green ; feathers of the wings and fore- 
part of the back of a lighter green, with deep black margins ; 
some scattered, extremely minute, piliform, pencil-tipped 
white plumelets on the neck. In spring, an additional tuft 
of oblong, erect, recurved feathers, about two inches in length, 
on the top of the head. Young with the head and hind-neck 
greenish-brown, the rest of the upper parts darker, the imbri- 
cated feathers of the back and wings with glossy margins ; 
the lower parts brownish-grey; the throat and part of the 
breast inclining to white. 
Male, 29, 42, 10-J, 5|, 2 T 3 p 4, 4J. Female, 26, 38. 
The Crested Cormorant is generally distributed along our 
coasts, and very abundant in many parts of Scotland, resid- 
ing chiefly in caverns and fissures of the rocks, where it also 
breeds. The nest is bulky ; the eggs two or three, subellip- 
tical, very narrow, bluish- white, two inches and a quarter 
long, and inch and a half in breadth. It sits deep on the 
water, when alarmed sinks so as to expose only the head and 
neck, swims and dives with extreme dexterity, feeds on small 
fishes, can scarcely walk, stands in a much inclined posture, 
and emits a croaking cry. Its flesh is dark-coloured and rank, 
