The bird lives on fish, which it darts upon from a considerable height. James Montgomery thus describes this mode of taking their prey:-- "Eager for food, their searching eyes they fix'd On Ocean's unroll'd volume, from a height That brought immensity within their scope; Yet with such power of vision look'd they down, As though they watch'd the shell-fish slowly gliding O'er sunken rocks, or climbing trees of coral, On indefatigable wing upheld, Breath, pulse, existence, seem'd suspended in them; They were as pictures painted on the sky; Till suddenly, aslant, away they shot, Like meteors chang'd from stars in gleams of lightning. And struck upon the deep; where, in wild play, Their quarry flounder'd, unsuspecting harm. With terrible voracity they plunged Their heads among the affrighted shoals, and beat A tempest on the surges with their wings, Till flashing clouds of foam and spray conceal'd them. Nimbly they seized and secreted their prey, Alive and wriggling, in th' elastic net Which Nature hung beneath their grasping beaks; Till, swoll'n with captures, th' unwieldy burthen Clogg'd their slow flight, as heavily to land These mighty hunters of the deep return'd. There on the cragged cliffs they perched at ease, Gorging their hapless victims one by one; Then, full and weary, side by side they slept, Till evening roused them to the chase again." _Pelican Island._ Great numbers of Pelicans are killed for their pouches, which are converted by the native Americans into purses, &c. When carefully prepared, the membrane is as soft as silk, and sometimes embroidered by Spanish ladies for work-bags, &c. It is used in Egypt by the sailors, whilst attached to the two under chaps, for holding or baling water. With the Pelican has been associated an old popular error, which has not long disappeared from books of information: it is that of the Pelican feeding her young with her blood. In reference to the actual economy of the Pelican, we find that, in feeding the nestlings--and the male is said to supply the wants of the female, when sitting, in the same manner--the under mandible is pressed against the neck and breast, to assist the bird in disgorging the contents of the capacious pouch; and during this action the red nail of the upper mandible would appear to come in contact with the breast, thus laying the foundation, in all probability, for the fable that the Pelican nourishes her young with her blood, and for the attitude in which the imagination of painters has placed the bird in books of emblems, &c., with the blood spirting from the wounds made by the terminating nail of the upper mandible into the gaping mouths of her offspring.