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THE BITTEBN 



IT was a great day for me when I first heard 

 the so-called booming of the bittern. For more 

 than ten years I had devoted the principal part 

 of my spare hours to the study of birds, but 

 though I had taken many an evening walk near 

 the most promising meadows in my neighbor- 

 hood, I could never hear those mysterious pump- 

 ing or stake-driving noises of which I had read 

 with so much interest, especially in the writings 

 of Thoreau. 



The truth was, as I have since assured myself, 

 that this representative of the heron family was 

 not a resident within the limits of my everyday 

 rambles, none of the meadows thereabout being 

 extensive and secluded enough to suit his whim. 



There came a day, however, when with a 

 friend I made an afternoon excursion to Way- 

 land, Massachusetts, on purpose to form the 

 stake-driver's acquaintance. We walked up the 

 railway track across the river toward Sudbury, 



