ADULT LITTLE BLUE HERON, FROM THE BOAT 
CHAPTER IV 
THE GREAT CUTHBERT ROOKERY 
For this outrage I heard the poor bird 
Say a tho2isand viournfiil things 
To the wind, which, on its wings. 
To the guardian of the sky 
Bore her melancholy cry. 
De Villegas, translated. 
A bout fifteen years ago it was known to the plume- 
hunters that somewhere in the great mangrove swamp 
^ near the southern extremity of Florida was a very 
large rookery, or breeding colony, of herons, egrets, and 
other water-birds. Hitherto all efforts to locate it had proved 
unavailing—a fact which will surprise no one who has been 
even to the portals of that terrible wilderness. At length, 
an individual named Cuthbert, with a hardihood worthy of 
a better cause, made a business of tracing out this mysterious 
