98 
ROOM XIII. 
Nat. Hist. 
a bag, in which they keep the fish, as they catch them, 
to feed their young; as the true Pelican, which has a 
broad beak and enormous pouch ; the Cormorant has a 
slender bill and rounded tail, while the tail of the 
Frigate-bird is forked ; the Booby, so called from its 
excessive stupidity, has a broad bill; and the Darter is 
peculiar for the small size of its body and the length 
of its neck : the Tropic Bird, which resembles the 
Gulls in form, has two long feathers in the middle of 
its tail. 
The Petrels (Cases 83—85) have compressed bills, 
strongly hooked at the end; their hind claw is placed 
immediately on the tarsus, without any toe. Of all the 
Water Birds, these keep more especially out at sea; they 
often fly so far from land that during tempests they are 
obliged to take refuge aboard the vessels they may hap¬ 
pen to fall in with. They build in holes on rocks, and 
when attacked, squirt out a quantity of acrid oil from 
their stomachs. Some have the nostrils placed on the 
top of the beak, forming a single tube, as in the Pe¬ 
trels, and others have them formed of two tubes placed 
on the side of the beak, as the Albatrosses, peculiar 
for their very long wings, furnished with long quills only 
at the top. 
The Gulls (Cases 86-—88) have a simple compressed 
bill, pointed at the end, with moderate and longitudinal 
nostrils. They live on the sea-shore, and eat fish and 
carrion of all kinds. The young are generally of a 
dark, speckled-gray colour, the adult gray or white. 
The true Gulls have rounded tails; from them the Ra¬ 
zor-bill only differs in the under jaw being longest, and 
much compressed. The Terns have forked tails, and 
the Boobies square tails and very long wings. The 
Lestris, or Skua Gull, differs from the common Gull 
by having the two middle tail feathers longer than 
the rest. Their habits are disgusting, subsisting chiefly 
on food rejected from the stomach of the common Gull, 
in its alarm when chased by the Skua, and which the 
latter catches before it falls into the water. 
Over 
