11 
Dr. R. 0. Cunningham on the Solan Goose. 
that “ the natives make a pudding of the fat of this fowl in the 
stomach of it, and boil it in their water-gruel which they call 
Brochan; they drink it likewise for removing the cough: it is 
by daily experience found to be an excellent vulnerary.” 
In O’Flaherty’s ‘ West or H-Iar Connaught/ written in 
1684, and published by the Irish Archaeological Society in 1846, 
there occurs (p. 12) the following notice of the bird :—“ Here 
the ganet soares high in the sky to espy his prey in the sea 
under him, at which he casts himself headlong, and swallows up 
whole herrings in a morsell. This bird flys through the ships’ 
sailes piercing them with his beak.” 
An account of the Gannet is given by Sir Robert Sibbald in 
his ‘ History, ancient and modern, of the Sheriffdoms of Fife 
and Kinross, with the description of both, and of the Firths of 
Forth and Tay, and the Islands in them’*, which was published 
at Edinburgh in 1710 ; but as it contains no information which 
does not occur in the works of his predecessors, it is unnecessary 
to say more with regard to it. Albin describes the bird in the 
first volume of his ‘ Natural History of Birds,’ which made its ap¬ 
pearance in 1738. He remarks correctly that it “has no Nos¬ 
trils, but in their stead a Furrow extended on each Side through 
the whole Length of the Bill.” The illustration which accom¬ 
panies his description is remarkable, for the bird is represented 
as having five toes ! 
The next account of the Solan Goose deserving of notice occurs 
in Bishop Pontoppidan’s ‘Natural History of Norway,’ which was 
published in 1752, and translated into English three years sub¬ 
sequently. “The Hav Sule,” the worthy bishop informs us, 
“ is a large Sea-bird which somewhat resembles a Goose : the head 
and neck are rather like those of a Stork, excepting that the bill 
is shorter and thicker, and is yellowish; the legs are long f; 
a-cross the back and wings the colour is a light blue ; the breast 
and long neck are white; towards the head it is green mix’d 
with black, and on the top there is a red comb: the tail and 
wings are both distinguished by some white feathers at the ends, 
* Part II. chapter II. p. 47. 
f [The translation is here very loose. In the original the sentence 
stands more correctly, being u The legs are as in a Skarf,” i. e. Pliala- 
crocorcix. —Ed. ] 
