160 <I(4{MBLES OF A <DOfMINie 



time lets him pass unheeded ; his grey coat no longer is 

 a mark for bolt or bird. 



In the heron's days of fame the tall crane was perhaps 

 as plentiful as he. Now, while the one is scattered still 

 through every corner of the kingdom, the other is but a 

 straggler from foreign shores, a casual caller who visits 

 us, in passing merely, on the wing for distant lands. But 

 the crane built his house, so to speak, upon the sand. 

 His nest was on the ground, among the reed-beds of the 

 fens. Centuries have passed since spade and plough 

 broke up his haunts among the marshes. The heron, 

 on the other hand, builds among the boughs of trees, 

 in the shelter of guarded game-covers, or in solitary 

 spots seldom harried by the spoiler, and thus, within 

 English bounds alone, more than a hundred heronries 

 remain. 



Seen far off at his solitary watch by the river, or on 

 wide levels of the marshland, the heron is not an 

 unfamiliar figure ; well we know his stately flight when, 

 drifting to his home among the hills, his wings are dark 

 upon the sunset sky. 



But on the margin of the forest, where a belt of wood- 

 land screens a sheet of quiet water, lies a little islet, over- 

 grown with oaks and birches, safe sanctuary for teal 

 and wild duck, the very " haunt of coot and hern." The 

 wintry sunshine brightens the long strip of green that 

 lines the shore, lingers on the red bark of graceful fir- 

 trees, lifting slender shafts above the underwood, and lies 

 in lines of silver on the quiet pool. Softly, with silent 

 oars, we glide along the creek, in whose still depths are 



