16 FIFTEEN DAYS ON THE DANUBE. 



trace of the red colour to be seen. I was much delighted at 

 adding such a splendid bird to our collection on the first day's 

 shooting, for this Night-Heron was one of the gems of the 

 spoils which we brought home. 



Immediately after having been so fortunate as to shoot 

 this long-desired bird, I knocked down another Grey Heron 

 from one of the nests close by, and then waded back across 

 the channel to join the other sportsmen. By the advice of 

 Count Zichy, we now determined to leave the herons, as 

 they had become very shy and suspicious, and to pay a 

 murderous visit to a breeding-place of Cormorants, at no 

 great distance, while both the Hodeks, guided by one of the 

 keepers, went back to the vessel with the slain herons, in 

 order that the birds might not lie too long in the hot sun. 



We at first struck into the above-mentioned footpath, and 

 soon reached a luxuriantly green thicket, where the high 

 wood of the heronry gradually disappeared, the trees kept 

 getting smaller and the undergrowth denser. Our way then 

 led us past a nursery-garden, and across a little meadow to 

 the bank of a large arm of the Danube, which bounded one 

 side of the island. There Sand-Martins darted about the 

 steep, crumbling banks, and Mallards rose noisily from the 

 water. The thickets now grew more straggling, and we 

 came to a pasture only studded with a few young trees, most 

 of them chestnuts. This pasture was bordered by fields, and 

 beyond them was a low wood, with a clump of very high 

 elms at its further extremity. These were the trees occupied 

 by the Cormorants' nests, above which we could see the heavy 

 forms of the birds looking like black spots. 



As we walked over these fields along the water's edge, a 

 wonderful picture presented itself. On one side was the high 

 rich green wood of the heronry, girt with a seemingly 

 impenetrable fringe of dense thickets ; above it circled the 

 frightened herons, some of them flying so high up that, with 



