240 HABITS OF BIRDS. 



be somewhat tinged with poetry. fi Those," says 

 he, " who have walked in an evening by the sedgy 

 sides of unfrequented rivers, must remember a variety 

 of notes from different water-fowl ; the loud scream 

 of the wild goose, the croaking of the mallard, the 

 whining of the lap-wing, and the tremulous neighing 

 of the jack-snipe. But of all those sounds there is 

 none so dismally hollow as the booming of the bit- 

 tern. It is impossible for words to give those who 

 have not heard this evening call, an adequate idea 

 of its solemnity. It is like the interrupted bellowing 

 of a bull, but hollower and louder, and is heard at a 

 mile's distance, as if issuing from some formidable 

 being that resided at the bottom of the waters*." 

 Southey represents this sound as being heard at a 

 distance : 



At evening o'er the swampy plain 



The bittern's boom came farf ." 



The earliest explanation we have met with of the 

 manner in which this sound is produced, is by Aris- 

 totle, who introduces it amongst his Problems. 

 " Why," says he, " do those, which are called Bo- 

 mugi, and which are fabulously reported to be bulls, 

 consecrated to some deity, usually dwell among 

 marshes, which are situate near rivers ? Is the 

 sound really so like the bellowing of a bull, that, 

 if it is heard by oxen, they are as much affected by 

 it, as if they felt sensible some bull was bellowing ? 

 Is not such a sound produced when rivers inundate 

 marshes, or marshes overflow their boundaries, and 

 are either roughly checked in their impetuous course 

 by the sea, and thence send forth a rushing sound ? 

 Similar sounds are produced in caverns under ground, 

 into which currents of water rush and dispel the air 

 through small apertures; and also when a man 

 * Animated Nature, iii. 263. f Thalaba. 



