DIVING BIRDS AT THE ZOO 
85 
cormorant also they allow their wings to float parallel 
with the body, and the long black-and-white feathers 
and tail, loosely set on, and retaining quantities of 
air in the interstices, are at once transformed by a 
surface of velvet and quicksilver as the bird descends. 
But, unlike the cormorant, it keeps its neck drawn 
back in the form of a flattened S when in pursuit of 
the fish. Once within striking distance, the sharp bill 
is shot out as if from a catapult, and the fish is 
spiked through and carried to the surface. This 
ascent is made after each single capture. Sometimes 
the bird has great difficulty in disentangling the 
pierced fish from the spear-like beak, and its com- 
panion adroitly relieves it of the struggling victim 
and swallows the prize. The brain capacity of these 
creatures is probably less in proportion to their size 
than that of any other bird. After years of fami- 
liarity with their keeper, they would as soon dart their 
piercing bills into his eye as into the body of a fish, 
and are probably the lowest in the scale of intelligence 
as well as in development of the bird creation. Yet 
their movements below water are graceful and precise, 
and their skill in their one accomplishment of fish- 
spearing is unrivalled by human dexterity. 
