THE NIGHT SIDE OF NATURE 79 



away through the darkness. A bend in the stream 

 brings us to a quiet river reach with brown pebbles 

 and a shallow. A sentinel heron that has been 

 standing watchful on one leg rises, and flaps languidly 

 away down the stream. The consumptive figure of 

 this gaunt bird stands by the river through all 

 weathers. He knows not times nor seasons, and is a 

 great poacher. In the wind, when taking his lone 

 stand, his loose fluttering feathers look like drift- 

 stuff caught in the bushes. He reminds one of the 

 consumptive, but, unlike him, has wonderful powers 

 of digestion, and withal an immense capacity for 

 fish. Woe to the luckless mort or trout that comes 

 within reach of his formidable pike, or to the attacking 

 peregrine that he attempts to impale on his bill. 

 The heron is essentially a wanderer, and, like Words- 

 worth's immortal leech-gatherer, he roams from pond 

 to pond, from moor to moor. Herons come and go 

 by the same routes; and night after night have I 

 flushed my fisher from the self-same shallow. 



I am now by the covert side, and a strange churring 

 sound comes from out the darkened glades. Waiting 

 silently beneath the bushes, I hear it approach 

 nearer and nearer until a loud flapping is heard 

 among the boughs. The object approaches quite 

 closely, and I see that the noise is produced by a 

 large bird striking its wings together as they meet 

 behind. Even in the darkness it may be detected 



