A GEE AT BLUE HERON. 201 



my steps, being now highly curious to see 

 how near the fellow I could get. At this 

 he broke into a kind of dog-trot, very com- 

 ical to witness, and, if I had not previously 

 seen him fly a few yards, I should have 

 supposed him disabled in the wing. Dr. 

 Brewer, by the way, says that this bird is 

 "never known to run, or even to walk 

 briskly;" but such negative assertions are 

 always at the maker's risk. 



He picked up his legs at last, for I pressed 

 him closer and closer, till there could not 

 have been more than forty or fifty feet be- 

 tween us; but even then he settled down 

 again beside another pool, only a few rods 

 further on in the same meadow, and there 

 I left him to pursue his frog-hunt unmo- 

 lested. The ludicrousness of the whole 

 affair was enhanced by the fact, already 

 mentioned, that the ground was perfectly 

 flat, and absolutely without vegetation, ex- 

 cept for the long rows of newly planted cran- 

 berry vines. As to what could have influ- 

 enced the bird to treat me thus strangely, I 

 have no means of guessing. As we say of 

 each other's freaks and oddities, it was his 

 way, I suppose. He might have behaved 



