The peculiar form, long wings, and large fan-like tail of the Anhinga, would at once induce a person looking upon it to conclude that it was intended by nature rather for protracted and powerful flight, than for spending as it does more than half of its time by day in the water, where its progress, one might suppose, would be greatly impeded by the amplitude of these parts. Yet how different from such a supposition is the fact? The Anhinga in truth is the very first of all fresh-water divers. With the quickness of thought it disappears beneath the surface, and that so as scarcely to leave a ripple on the spot; and when your anxious eyes seek around for the bird, you are astonished to find it many hundred yards distant, the head perhaps merely above water for a moment; or you may chance to perceive the bill alone gently cutting the water, and producing a line of wake not observable beyond the distance of thirty yards from where you are standing. With habits like these it easily eludes all your efforts to procure it. When shot at while perched, however severely wounded they may be, they fall at once perpendicularly, the bill downward, the wings and tail closed, and then dive and make their way under water to such a distance that they are rarely obtained. Should you, however, see them again, and set out in pursuit, they dive along the shores, attach themselves to roots of trees or plants by the feet, and so remain until life is extinct. When shot dead on the trees, they sometimes cling so firmly to the branches that you must wait some minutes before they fall.