224 Tue Brirps Axsout Us. 
rather nocturnal ways, is better known by name than 
by personal observation. Still, the bittern is not dif- 
ficult to approach, and when it gains a little confi- 
dence, or has its young to look after, may be seen to 
advantage if you are not too demonstrative. Why is 
it, by the way, that women are never content with ob- 
serving a sitting bird? Even if it is a thrush in the 
middle of his song, the chances are she will scream 
and “shoo!” Queer things. The bittern in the Mid- 
dle States is both resident and migratory. It builds 
a nest of sticks and grass, the sticks being the foun- 
dation, in the marsh, where the bird lives the greater 
part of the time; and if you pass by at mid-day, the 
chances are you will not know that such a bird is 
anywhere near you. If you do flush it, you see a pair 
of brown wings lazily flapped, see an awkward neck 
thrust out ahead and a pair of long legs that almost 
dangle. You hear a wok, very like the gag pre- 
liminary to vomiting, and then, settled to work, a 
graceful flight, if the bird intends to go any distance. 
I remember one bittern that spent the summer on my 
meadows that invariably, when flushed, flew to the 
hill-side near by, a distance of about seven hundred 
yards, and alighted on the same tree always. When 
I passed by, and was nowhere near the nest in the 
marsh, the bird would promptly return. This bittern, 
from March to November, remained, I think, daily 
in the one small tract of marshy meadow. 
At night the bittern makes a most curious sound, 
which has been described as “booming.” I was 
always of opinion that the sound was made while the 
bird had its beak in water, but it seems not, and 
