STORKS, HERONS, AND PELICAN TRIBE 55 



approached. In the nests with young there was a 

 great difference in age and size, one being about 

 a day or so old, and the oldest nearly ready to 

 leave the nest — some two or three weeks old — so 

 that evidently the birds lay their four eggs at con- 

 siderable intervals, and begin to sit on depositing 

 the first. After wandering about, a matter of 

 difficulty on account of the mud, we found a clutch 

 of only three eggs, and one of four, which I man- 

 aged to blow. We also obtained two clutches of 

 eggs of the purple heron, but some of the latter 

 had young." 



The Ibises, though much alike in form, are 

 strangely diverse in colour. One species was 

 sacred to the Ancient Egyptians. The reverence 

 and affection they showed to this bird, above all 

 others, is probably largely due to its migrating 

 habits, which obtained in that far past just as 

 they do to-day. The naturalist Brehm says on 



Ph^io h If. F. D.,r,d,, F.Z.S. 



i'hoto 01 iiihoiaitit Photo, Co. 



YOUNG COMMON HERONS 



Tiese birds have not yet acquired their full plumage 



COMMON NIGHT-HERON 



this subject: "When the Nile, after being at its 

 lowest ebb, rose again, and the water assimied 

 a red tinge, then the ibis appeared in the land 

 of the Pharaohs as a sure guarantee that the 

 stream — the giver and preserver of life, which 

 the people in their profound reverence raised to 

 the rank of a god — would once again empty the 

 well-spring of plenty over the thirsty land. The 

 servant and messenger of an all-bounteous Deity 

 commanded of a necessity a reverence of a poetic 

 and distinguished character, by reason of its im- 

 portance : he too must be a god." 



The glossy ibis has been found breeding in 

 colonies of thousands in Slavonia The nests are 

 large structures formed of sticks and a few weeds, 

 never far from the water, and many even, in the 

 colonv referred to, were so near the surface that 

 they appeared to be floating. The eggs, three or 

 four in number, are of a beautiful greenish blue. 

 The young, while still unable to fly, climb actively 

 among the branches of the trees in which the nest 

 is placed, clinging so firmly with the feet as to 

 be removed with difficulty. 



The Herons .and Bitterns. 



In the first mentioned of these two groups 

 the CoMJiON Heron is the best known. Indeed. 



