A Bird’s-Eye View 

in large colonies or in pairs, and rails, found in 
open, reedy swamps. Herons asa class are large 
and aérial, while rails are much smaller and es- 
sentially ground birds, rarely on the wing, and, 
with their strangely attenuated bodies (which 
have made them the proverbial type of thinness) 
easily gliding among the closely growing reeds 
and rushes of the marsh. ‘This class furnishes 
one of the best game birds in the country—the 
Carolina rail—extremely abundant in their fa- 
vorite resorts during migration. From their 
peculiar figure and character of habitat, rails 
are often called mud-hens. 
Of the herons, which serve only for beauty 
and not for use, the most abundant in the East- 
ern States are the night heron, the great blue, 
and the green herons. The handsomest of the 
class, the great white heron, is, unfortunately, 
only arare straggler from the South, and its min- 
iature fac-simile, the little white heron, is almost 
as rare. 
Along almost every stream can be seen the 
- curiously teetering, spotted sandpiper, whose 
grotesque mannerisms make one wonder whether 
he is suffering from hereditary uncouthness, or 
expressing something inexplicable. 
Here and there at a pond may be found the 
67 
