THE CORMORANT. 
215 
The poet could not, indeed, easily have selected a fitter 
frame for the foul fiend than that of a Cormorant : 
there is something so unearthly about him, as he is 
seen reposing on a rock when gorged with food ; his 
slouching form, his wet and yapid wings dangling 
from his sides to catch the breeze, while his weird, 
haggard, wildly-staring emerald-green eyes scowl 
about in all directions. 
The quantities of fish one of these birds will 
devour is astonishing — three or four pounds a day, 
or about half their weight, — a Cormorant weighing 
from six to seven pounds. What should we say of 
a man’s eating seventy or eighty pounds of beef or 
mutton at his daily meals? which he would do were 
his appetite as great in proportion as that of the 
Cormorant’s. The fact is, that, like most birds 
living on fish, its digestion is extremely rapid, and 
it therefore requires a proportionably larger supply 
of food, of which if it is deprived, it soon dies, 
as is often known to be the case. Thus, on the 
western coast of the Hebrides, these poor birds 
suffer severely, when, during and after a continued 
gale, the Atlantic rolls in its enormous billows, 
dashing them against the headlands, and scouring 
with their fury the sounds and creeks. As far as 
the eye can reach, the ocean boils and heaves, pre- 
senting one boundless field of foam, the spray from 
the summits of the waves sweeping along the waste 
like drifted snow: no sign of life is to be seen, 
save when a Gull, labouring hard to bear itself up 
against the blast, hovers over head, or darts by like 
a meteor. If, at such a season, the haunts of the 
Cormorants are visited, they will be found huddled 
