Frank the Heron 
which stands up on their heads and all 
over their bodies in the most comical 
way imaginable. When they grow a 
little bigger, and can stand erect on 
their legs instead of having to squat at 
the bottom of the nest, this down 
gradually disappears as the feathers 
grow underneath ; and when the parents 
appear overhead on their big hollow 
wings, and drop their long legs ready to 
alight on the nest, what an outcry there 
is as all five of them raise themselves up 
on tip-toe and stretch out their long 
necks and open their mouths, each one 
anxious to have its share first! Very 
often in their eagerness one or two of 
them will fall out of their nest. 
Except in the nesting-season they are 
unsociable birds, and the young soon 
separate after they have left the nest. 
170 
