164 THE BLACK-HEADBD BVhL. 



Tlie Black-headed GruU is the most beautiful and mo8l 

 sociable of its genus. They make their appearance on thf 

 coast of New Jersey in the latter part of April ; and do nw 

 fail to give notice of their arrival by their familiarity and 

 loquacity. The inhabitants treat them with the same 

 indifference that they manifest towards all those harmless 

 birds which do not minister either to their appetite or their 

 avarice ; and hence the Black-Heads may be seen in com 

 panics around the farm-house, coursing along the river-shores, 

 gleaning up the refuse of the fishermen, and the animal 

 substances left by the tide ; or scattered over the marshes 

 and newly-ploughed fields, regaling on the worms, insects^ 

 and their larvae, which, in the vernal season, the bounty of 

 Nature provides for the sustenance of myriads of the 

 feathered race. 



On the Jersey side of the Delaware Bay, in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Fishing Creek, about the middle of May, the 

 Black-headed GruUs assemble in great multitudes, to feed 

 upon the remains of the king-crabs which the hogs have left, 

 or upon the spawn which those curious animals deposit in 

 the sand, and which is scattered along the shore by the 

 waves. At such times, if any one approach to disturb them, 

 the Gulls will rise up in clouds, every individual squalling 

 so loud, that the roar may be heard at the distance of two 

 yt three miles. 



It is an interesting spectacle to behold this spedes when 

 ftboot reoommendng their migrations. If the weather h% 



