THE BITTERN. 271 



marking, sufficiently prove them to be two distinct 

 species, although hitherto, the present has been classed 

 as a mere variety of the European Bittern. These birds, 

 we are informed, visit Severn river at Hudson's Bay, 

 about the beginning of June; make their nests in 

 swamps, laying four cinereous green eggs among the 

 long grass. The young are said to be, at first, black. 



" These birds, when disturbed, rise with a hollow Jcwa, 

 and are then easily shot down as they fly heavily. Like 

 other night birds, their sight is most acute during the 

 evening twilight; but their hearing is, at all times, 

 exquisite. 



" The American Bittern is twenty-seven inches long, 

 and three feet four inches in extent ; from the point of 

 the bill to the extremity of the toes, it measures three 

 feet ; the bill is four inches long ; the upper mandible 

 black ; the lower greenish-yellow ; lares and eyelids, yel- 

 low ; irides, bright yellow ; upper part of the head, flat, and 

 remarkably depressed; the plumage there is of a deep 

 .blackish brown, long behind and on the neck, the general 

 color of which is a yellowish brown, shaded with darker ; 

 this long plumage of the neck the bird can throw forward 

 at will, when irritated, so as to give him a more formi- 

 dable appearance ; throat, whitish, streaked with deep 

 brown : from the posterior and lower part of the auricu- 

 lars, a broad patch of deep black passes diagonally across 

 the neck, a distinguished characteristic of this species ; 

 the back is deep brown, barred, and mottled with innu- 



