18 SUPPLEMENT TO 
forward to with the keenest excitement by the farmers whose land 
adjoined the cliffs tenanted by these birds. ‘The slain were handed over 
to the fishermen to be cut up and used by them in baiting their crab- 
pots. They were mostly birds of the year, which perhaps accounts for the 
inadequate description of the plumage given by Montagu in his ‘ Ornitho- 
logical Dictionary.” During the past four years some fifty specimens have 
been examined, chiefly in the spring months, when most of the specimens 
had crests. 
‘* Both sexes assume the crest, and it is a curious fact that, amongst 
those that had crests—-about two-thirds of the number,—only two proved 
on dissection to be males, and in these birds the crests were equally as 
well developed as in some of the best females, but not more so. 
“In January, rarely earlier, the birds commence to exhibit the crest, 
and throughout February, March, and until incubation is over in April, 
the birds are in their best possible plumage. very bird examined in 
March had a crest more or less developed, not excepting birds in the dingy 
grey, or second year’s plumage. By the end of April, or first week in 
May, the crest is shed, and in ten birds examined during the first week 
of the latter month the crest was entirely lost; but traces of abnormal 
excitement were found in the skin covering the skull in the whole number, 
consisting of both sexes, for the skin here, and only here, was full of 
‘stub feathers,’ the rest of the dermis being carefully examined and 
found absolutely free from them, The rest of the plumage is unaffected, 
the birds retaining their beautiful dark glossy green appearance till the 
end of the summer. 
‘* From an external examination, the male can generally be distinguished 
from the female by its size, being a bigger bird, with a more massive 
bill, The males generally weigh over 4 lbs., females from 33 lbs. to 
exceptionally 3? lbs., and the former average 2 inches longer than the 
latter.” 
Mr. Elliot has since informed us that “the method of erecting the 
crest in the Shag and Cormorant is different; the crest of the Shag has 
a natural curve forward, and is spread ont fan-shape; in the Cormorant 
there is a double crest, an ill-developed frontal one, and another which 
runs some way down the neck, and is erected somewhat after the fashion 
of the hair on a dog’s back when set up.” 
Bittern (p. 191). 
Mr. W. V. Toll has informed us that he has heard at Strete three 
Bitterns calling at once of a winter’s night in the sky high above him. 
In the winter of 1891 these hirds were very plentiful on his Ley, and he 
believes at least a dozen were shot, chiefly by visitors staying at the 
Sands Hotel. He came across several wounded birds near his house. 
The following winter he neither saw nor heard a single Bittern. If the 
boats could be kept off Slapton Ley we might still have Bitterns nesting 
