BITTER N. 



of their known ones, which is inseparable from the 

 classification, must lead to error, and error winch, from 

 the difficulty there is in actually observing 1 the bittern, 

 is not easily corrected. 



No such conclusion as that the heron feeds chiefly 

 upon fish and the bittern upon insects, mollusca, and 

 aquatic reptiles and their spawn, can be drawn from 

 the qualities of the flesh of the two genera ; for though 

 there is a difference, and the flesh of the bittern is 

 described as more resembling that of hare, and the 

 flesh of the heron more that of pheasant, though 

 tougher ; yet that of the heron has little of the rank 

 and oily flavour, which, in aquatic birds, is usually 

 denominated fishy. It would seem that it is not 

 feeding on fish, but feeding on sea-fish, and partly also 

 on water beetles, which gives this peculiar ran 

 to the flesh of birds ; and though this is not a point 

 upon which any certain conclusion can be arrived at 

 without much previous observation and experiment, yet 

 it is not Improbable that the rank flavour is, in no small 

 degree, owing to phosphorus and sulphur (especially 

 of the former) in the food. The science of ornithology 

 is still, however, too much in its infancy for admitting 

 of a satisfactory conclusion upon such points ; and 

 yet, in so far as the economical use of birds is con- 

 cerned, they are points of no minor importance. 



In so far, however, as bitterns are concerned, the 

 importance in an economical point of view is not great. 

 The flesh of the common bittern is no doubt in request 

 for the tables of the luxurious ; and when a bird can 

 be obtained, which is but rarely, it sells for from 

 half-a-guinea to a guinea. This is, no doubt, in part 

 owing to its rarity : but it has a rich and rather an 

 agreeable flavour. 



But a " bittern preserve" is amongst the last pos- 

 sessions for which luxury can hope, and it is also 

 among the last which the friend of mankind would 

 desire to see. The cover which man can produce 

 artificially, may answer for the pheasant and the par- 

 tridge, and also for the hare, as a substitute in flavour 

 for the bittern ; because, in proportion as man drains 

 and improves the ground, and shelters it by planting, 

 the food of these animals becomes more abundant. 

 Even the heron may multiply in proportion as man 

 increases the number of his h'sh ponds and his woods 

 for these voracious fishers, though they come to 

 such places chiefly in the grey dawn of the morning, 

 and retire by the time that the heat makes the fishe 

 still, will come to the mill-pond, or even to the plea- 

 sure-ground near the dwelling-house, if there is afish- 

 pond there. But the bittern loves the seclusion o: 

 wild nature ; and no known temptation will bring it 

 upon the cultivated or improved lands as a permanent 

 resident ; and when the scarcity of the winter forces 

 it from the upland, it appears to come down reluctant 

 and stealthily; and seeks those streams and banks 

 which are in the rudest and least improved state 

 The bittern, as already said, does not like trees ; am! 

 it is never found by those waters which have either 

 pebbly beaches, or a sod of rich grass down to the 

 water's edge. Some of the running birds come to 

 the beaches in the winter, and the goose and swim- 

 ming duck tribes to the grassy banks ; but if the soi 

 is rich enough to bear even flags and reeds, it is 

 shunned by the bittern. The bog-bent and the rush 

 are the favourite plants with this bird ; and it if 

 fully more true to them than the cross-bill is to the 

 pine forest. Those are plants which very few insects 

 inhabit, and which we do not often find oaten 



any creature ; and therefore, remaining in thorn, the 

 cittern cannot be very insectivorous. Horse-leeches 

 and the smaller grey slugs ure, however, to be met 

 vith in the vicinity of these plants ; and both the 

 pecies which have been mentioned, have those parts 

 of the young roots which are in the humid earth and 

 )lanched, very albuminous, and very sweet to the 

 .aste. These could easily be dug out by a much less 

 ^flicient bill than that of the bittern ; and as they do 

 lot require trituration in a gizzard, as is the case 

 with most seeds, the fact of the bitterns having only 

 membranous stomachs, and very short cteca to their 

 ntestinal canals, is no good argument against their 

 ceding on the roots of those plants. Indeed, in those 

 places which appear to be preferred by them, if they 

 do not occasionally feed on these roots in the winter, 

 t is very difficult to imagine on what they can feed. 

 Fishing, by any wading bird, even if we are to sup- 

 pose the bittern a wader, is out of the question at the 

 season alluded to. There are few fishes in those 

 places at, any time of the year; and even the herons 

 quit the upland brooks, and retire to places which are 

 warmer before the intensity of the winter sets in. It 

 is possible that when the bitterns descend the streams, 

 they may eat the spawn of those fishes which deposit 

 it in such places in the end of autumn and the early 

 part of winter ; but when they descend they follow 

 the rushes, and other herbage which is firmly rooted; 

 and these are not generally the depositories of the 

 spawn of fishes. 



In summer, so far as the observation of the writer 

 of this article has gone (which has, however, been 

 chiefly where the moors were very bleak and bare, 

 with the bittern pools on the very summit, or at all 

 events at the water-shed, where there was only a small 

 pool for the wild goose in the winter, and the aquatic 

 plants equisetums not reeds, with broad margins of 

 hummock and rush, and then hard bent outward to 

 the heather,) the heron never ascended so high as 

 the abode .of the bittern ; and though one cannot 

 speak with so much certainty of the marchings ot 

 the bitterns, as they are both hidling and silent, 

 except during the breeding season, yet 'they were not 

 observed so far down the streams as the places 

 occasionally frequented by herons, unless when 

 " frozen out'' at their native places. 



Thus, in whatever point of view we consider them, 

 bitterns are a very singular race of birds, peculiar 

 in their habits, and characteristic of a very peculiar 

 state of the countries, or at all events the districts, in 

 which they are found. They are, as it were, the 

 children of desolation ; and they hide themselves 

 there, and will not be either enticed or driven to better 

 pastures ; nor can they be made in any way to accom- 

 modate themselves to, or partake in, the improvements 

 which are made by man, or even in those which take 

 place from natural causes. 



Improved places of the latter description are found 

 only among the mountains ; and even there the course 

 of nature is more frequently the reverse: the transi- 

 tion from grove or copse to peat-bog, and the coS- 

 sumption of heath by moss and lichen. There are, 

 hovever, some instances of natural improvement ; a 

 flood of more than ordinary strength and duration, 

 will sometimes break down the natural dani which 

 retains the stagnant water, wash away part of the 

 miry soil, and drain the remainder ; and when this 

 takes place, the subsequent rains wash down sand 

 and more kindly particles of earth, and the seeds of the 

 Q Q '-> 



