cormorant
    n 1: large voracious dark-colored long-necked seabird with a
         distensible pouch for holding fish; used in Asia to catch
         fish [syn: cormorant, Phalacrocorax carbo]

Cormorant \Cor"mo*rant\ (k[^o]r"m[-o]*rant), n. [F. cormoran,
   fr. Armor. m[=o]r-vran a sea raven; m[=o]r sea + bran raven,
   with cor, equiv. to L. corvus raven, pleonastically prefixed;
   or perh. fr. L. corvus marinus sea raven.]
   1. (Zool.) Any species of Phalacrocorax, a genus of sea
      birds having a sac under the beak; the shag. Cormorants
      devour fish voraciously, and have become the emblem of
      gluttony. They are generally black, and hence are called
      sea ravens, and coalgeese. [Written also corvorant.]
      [1913 Webster]

   2. A voracious eater; a glutton, or gluttonous servant. --B.
      Jonson.
      [1913 Webster]

Cormorant
   (Lev. 11:17; Deut. 14:17), Heb. shalak, "plunging," or "darting
   down," (the Phalacrocorax carbo), ranked among the "unclean"
   birds; of the same family group as the pelican. It is a
   "plunging" bird, and is common on the coasts and the island seas
   of Palestine. Some think the Hebrew word should be rendered
   "gannet" (Sula bassana, "the solan goose"); others that it is
   the "tern" or "sea swallow," which also frequents the coasts of
   Palestine as well as the Sea of Galilee and the Jordan valley
   during several months of the year. But there is no reason to
   depart from the ordinary rendering.
   
     In Isa. 34:11, Zeph. 2:14 (but in R.V., "pelican") the Hebrew
   word rendered by this name is _ka'ath_. It is translated
   "pelican" (q.v.) in Ps. 102:6. The word literally means the
   "vomiter," and the pelican is so called from its vomiting the
   shells and other things which it has voraciously swallowed. (See PELICAN.)