BELOW THE RIVER BANK 



essay locomotion, and the first waddles of one of these 

 ungainly birds are easily watched from a considerable 

 distance, and are quite irresistible. A mother and child 

 used to come up from the secluded banks of the Ham 

 Branch in Franconia, and take an early morning or 

 late afternoon stroll in the meadows in full sight of the 

 cottage where we were spending the summer. "Here 

 come the herons!" was a familiar cry, which brought 

 us tumbling out upon the veranda. But it proved 

 useless to try to walk up on the birds. At first the 

 baby struggled back, at the note of warning from its 

 mother, with a great flapping of wings, into the bushes. 

 But in a short time it could fly as well as she, and both 

 birds would get up speed, swaying from side to side 

 on their long, spidery legs, thrusting out their necks and 

 flapping their great wings, the very acme of awkward- 

 ness, till suddenly, like an aeroplane leaving the ground, 

 they caught the air. Then their long legs trailed out 

 in a graceful line beneath them, their necks were folded 

 down, the soft blue of their feathers glinted in the sun, 

 and they sailed away with all the grace of supreme 

 efficiency, to a rhythmic beat of wings. Perhaps no 

 bird illustrates so complete a change from the shambling 

 and ungainly to the compact, graceful, even stately. 

 The blue heron are less numerous in our Berkshire 

 country than in wilder regions, of course, yet they are 

 not rare by any means, and often add their peculiar 

 touch of Japanese charm to our river vistas. Their 



