206 REMINISCENCES OF A SPORTSMAN. 



CHAP. XIX. 



THE BITTERN. — BREEDING OF THE BITTERX. — WILD GEESE. — THE 

 FLIGHT OF WILD GEESE. — BRENT GEESE. 



But the lark's shrill pipe shall come, 

 At the daybreak from the fallow, 

 And the bittern sound his di-um, 

 Booming from the sedgy hollow." 



Lady of the, Lake. Canto 1. 



" di-iving sleets 



Deform the day delightless, so that scarce 



The bittern knows his time, with bill engulfed, 



To shake the sounding marsh." — Thomson's Wnifer. 



The bittern has been, and j)erLaps not improperly, called 

 by many " the bird of desolation." We find its name in 

 Holy Writ about 2000 years ago ; the Prophet Isaiah, in 

 his threat against Babylon, says, " I will make it a pos- 

 session of the bitteai, and pools of water, and I will sweep 

 it with the besom of destruction " (ch. xiv. v. 23.) ; and 

 again (ch. xxxiv. v. 11.), in prophecies against God's 

 enemies, " But the cormorant and the bittern shall pos- 

 sess it, the owl also and raven shall dwell in it ; " and 

 the very name of the bittern conveys to the imagina- 

 tion the idea of solitude and barrenness. As Providence 



