161 

 NOTES ON THE HERON, {ARDEA CINEREA.) 



BY W. G. JOHNSTONE, ESQ. 



It was a delightful morning, the 4th, of April, when we awoke, our thoughts 

 intent on the pilgrimage about to be performed, to see for the first time not 

 only a Heronry, but one situated in that small lake where steam, as applied 

 to propelling vessels, first was tried, and that successfully,'^ The place in 

 itself is surpassing lovely, embosomed amongst slightly undulating green hills^ 

 with those of a sterner cast in the back ground, clothed to their summits 

 with the Tasselled Larch, (Larix,) and our hardy native Pine, {Finns 

 nylvestris ;) and extending again beyond these may be seen the heath-clad 

 mountains, where, in the words of the poet, 



"The martyrs lie; 

 Where Cameron's sword and his bible are seen, . 

 Engraved on the stone where the heather grows green. "f 



Indeed all around is sacred ground — the lake before us. Burns' (our national 

 poet,) Farm at Ellisland immediately behind us, Queensberry| looking down 

 upon us, surrounded on all sides by mountains till the chain is completed by 

 the dark-browed Crifiel, which guards the entrance to the Solway. 



But to the matter in hand; as I have before stated the Heronry is situated 

 on a small island in the lake. I was very particular in my examination of 

 it. The Heronry consists of forty-nine nests in all, of which two nests are 

 on birch trees, three on silver firs, four on ash, four on oak, four on larch, 

 seven on spruce, and twenty-five on elm; thus showing they are not at all 

 particular as to their choice of any one species of tree. I could not be sure 

 of how many birds there were, but I believe there would not be fewer than 

 eighty to ninety — forty or forty-five pairs; but from the screaming way they 

 fly about when one intrudes on their dominions, it is no easy matter to count 

 them. Though the nests are more numerous than the birds I have stated, 

 there might be, as I have no doubt there were, some of them old and 

 untenanted. The nests I observed are all placed, if not on the very summit of 

 the trees, at least as high as may be, and on the extremity of the branches, 

 no doubt that they may get easily into their nests, for did branches intervene 

 they would have difficulty in so doing; it is a most ludicrous sight to see 

 their long legs twirling about like as many Churn-staves before descending into 

 their nests. 



* The tiny little steamer was launched on the 14th. of November, 1788. The parties in the 

 boat were Patrick Miller, the Inventor; Eobert Burns, Poet; Alexander Nasmyth, the celebrated 

 Landscape Painter; Henry (now Lord) Brougham, who was then a young lad at school; and 

 Mr. Taylor, the Engineer. Thus showing priority to Fulton in America, or Bell in Renfrewshire. 



t It was in Sanquhar, among these hills, that Cameron's followers published their declaration 

 on the 22nd. of June, 1680; and it was in the old fortress of Sanquhar tliat King jaii 

 slept one night — August 31 st., 1617. y^ 



X Queensberry, a lofty mountain in the upper part of Dumfriesshi, 



VOL. III. 



