BIRDS. 
L 
162 
“ who took it obferved, that it had a tranfparent 
£t membrane under the eyelid, with which it co- 
££ vered at pleafure the whole eye, without ob- 
<c fcuring the fight or (hutting the eyelid ; a gra- 
£c cious provifion for the fecurity o( the eyes of 
fo weighty a creature, whofe method of tak- 
4t ing its prey is by darting headlong on it from 
“ a height of a hundred and fifty feet or more 
££ into the water. About four years ago one of 
££ thefe birds flying over Penzance , (a thing that 
££ rarely happens) and feeing fome pilchards lying 
££ on a fir-plank, in a cellar ufed for curing fdh, 
££ darted itfelf down with fuch violence, that it 
££ ftruck its bill quite through the board (about 
££ an inch and a quarter thick) and broke its 
££ neck.” 
Thefe birds are fometimes taken at fea by a 
deception of the like kind : The fifhermen faften 
a pilchard to a board, and leave it floating ; which 
inviting bait decoys the unwary Gannet to its own 
defir u£lion. 
A S 
Clafs II. 
We are uncertain whether the Gannet is found 
in any other part of Europe befides our own 
iflands ; except (as Mr. Ray fufpe£ls, the Su/a , 
defcribed in Cluftuf s Exotics , which breeds in the 
Ferroe 'iVlts, be the fame bird. In America there 
are two fpecies of birds of this genus, that bear 
a great refemblance to it in their general form, 
and their manner of preying. Mr. Catejby has 
given the figure of the head of one, which he 
calls the Greater Booby ; his defcription fuits that 
of the young Gannet ; but the angle on the 
lower mandible is a fpecific difference, that forbids 
our pronouncing it to be the fame. Einnieus 
very properly claffes our Britift) bird with the 
Pelecan ; but, in his fynonyms, confounds it with 
the bird defcribed by Sir Hans Sloane , hift. Jam. 
vol. i. p. 31. preface . whofe colors differ from 
the Gannet in each ftage of life. We continue 
it in the fame clafs, under the generical name of 
Corvorants , as more familiar to the Englijh ear 
than that of Pelecan , 
FINIS. 
