COMMON CORMORANT. 
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the Cormorant is not easily approached, but gets out 
of harm’s way by flight, not by having recourse to 
diving, like so many of the true aquatic tribes ; the 
flight is powerful, and, overland, is performed at a 
great height. In the firths it has favourite fishing- 
grounds, to which, at certain periods of the tide, 
it resorts regularly ; and we have often procured 
specimens by placing ourselves in concealment as 
near as possible to the line of flight, which, in seve- 
ral localities, had to pass over some narrow isthmus, 
or sufficiently near some jutting-out point of land, 
to be within shot. This Cormorant is easily do- 
mesticated, and will come readily to be fed ; and at 
one time, wo believe, there was such a royal office 
as “ Master of the Cormorants.” We have not seen 
any recent account of the fishing with these birds, 
nor has it been practised for a long period in this 
country. We do not know with certainty the ex- 
tra European range of this species ; but it may pro- 
bably extend to North-eastern Asia; Mr. Yarrell 
states, the Caspian Sea and India. Audubon describes 
the Cormorant as breeding along the Labrador coast, 
in parties of fifty or more pairs. 
In the full breeding plumage, the chin, and around 
the rictus, is white ; the head and neck, the middle 
line of the back, and entire under-parts, glossy 
bluish black ; and the cheeks and sides of the neck 
arc more or less interspersed with white lengthened 
hair-like feathers ; the occiput is furnished with a 
long, hackled, recumbent crest, erectile at will ; 
the shoulders and wings, except the quills, are 
