148 AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY. 



PUNKATUNK, THE BITTERN, 



Bj' E. C. Ali.en. 



In the west of Nova Scotia, the Chebogue River, leaving its birth- 

 place, a tiny woodland lake, wanders south and after many a twist and 

 turn through its extensive salt marshes, finally enters the Atlantic. 



Half way up the river, a high w^ooded point breaks from the 

 highlands on the west, and extends out into the marsh to within a few 

 rods of the water. On the lower side of this point is a little cove, 

 overgrown "with sedges, and bordered by a fringe of stunted spruce 

 and bayberry. For five years this cove has been the summer home of 

 Punkatunk the Bittern. He has always arrived about the first of April 

 and been joined a few days later by his mate; and when in the Autumn 

 the Bitterns have left the cove for the far south, there have always 

 been more than two. 



Very near the first of last May, there was one of those calm spring 

 mornings when the carrying power of every sound seems to be 

 magnified at least three fold. The sun was just breaking through the 

 river haze, and brightening the yet dark winter foliage of the spruces 

 on the point. A flock of crows whose favorite roosting place was in 

 these spruces and who for the last half hour had been making the air 

 resound with their regular morning medley, had flown down to the 

 marsh to feed. From the farms on the western shore, the sweet 

 trilling of song sparrows floated over the marshes, while from a 

 clump of alders near, a black-bird gave utterance to his sharp 

 "per-a-chee." Presently from out the cove came a deep measured 

 "punk, a- tunk;" fiive times repeated, and after a pause of two or three 

 minutes, again lepeated five times. 



If one could have seen the performer, he w^ould have seen a large 

 bird, with bill pointed straight heavenward, mottled brown back and 

 streaked buff and brown breast blending with the dead sedges as only 

 the wearing apparel of God's birds can blend with its surroundings, 

 and a golden-ringed eye that seemed ever scanning the horizon. 



The haze had lifted. In the air far down the river a dark speck 

 became visible, it grew larger; and presently the keen eye in the cove 

 could detect the same peculiar beating of the wings that his own knew. 



With a joyful cry Punkatunk rose from the cove and flapped eagerly 

 down the river to meet the new comer. They met, circled round and 

 round each other for a moment, then both returned to the cove and 

 began as diligently to search for food among the roots of the weeds, 

 as if they had never been parted. 



On the last day of May, a hummock in the middle of the cove 



