NIGHT-HERON. 501 
of the embryos in the other six eggs confirmed this idea. I should say the 
differences between them could not have been more than si# days, and 
certainly not less than three; so that the Night-Heron must commence 
sitting on the first egg laid, and while engaged in its incubation, keep on 
laying, at fixed intervals, the other two, which form the complement. . . . 
Besides the colony of Night-Herons at Honam, there is another at the 
Old Man’s Home, where a large pond is enclosed by a hedge of tall bushes 
and shrubs, and beyond this is a high wall all round. Among these bushes 
the Night-Herons muster in countless numbers, placing their nests on 
every suitable branch, though often only a few feet from the ground. 
They are held sacred by the priests in the adjoining temple, and no one is 
allowed to kill or disturb them.”’ 
The eggs of the Night-Heron, from three to five in number, are bluish 
green in colour. They vary in length from 2°18 to 1°8 inch, and in 
breadth from 1:5 to 1:3 inch. Some specimens are slightly paler than 
others. It is impossible to distinguish small eggs of this species from 
large examples of those of the Little Egret ; but on an average the eggs 
of the Night-Heron are larger. The eggs of the Buff-backed Heron, 
although similar in size, are distinguished by their much paler colour. 
The Night-Heron only rears one brood in the year; but if its first eggs 
are destroyed others are deposited, and the same nesting-place is used year 
after year. 
The general colour of the plumage of the adult Night-Heron is lavender- 
grey; the crown and nape, upper back, and scapulars are dark brown 
glossed with metallic green ; several long, white, cylindrical feathers form 
a crest on the nape; the forehead, eye-stripe, and the whole of the under- 
parts are pure white. Bull black ; legs and feet yellow, suffused with orange 
on the back of the tibial jomt; claws black; irides Indian red; lores and 
a bare space round the eye dark slate-grey. The female scarcely differs in 
colour from the male, and the winter plumage does not differ from that of 
summer. Young in first plumage have the general colour of the upper 
parts brown, shading into lavender-grey on the wings and tail ; the feathers 
of the head have nearly white shaft-lines, which broaden into white tips on 
the back; and all the wing and tail-feathers have white tips. All the 
feathers on the underparts, except the under tail-coverts, are brown, with 
broad white shaft-lines. In birds of the year the white shaft-lines and 
tips have disappeared from the upper parts except on the wing-coverts and 
primaries, and the underparts are white, more or less suffused with brown 
on the flanks and the sides of the neck. 
