THE GREAT HERON. 311 



THE GREAT HERON. 



The Great Heron of America, nowhere numerous, may be consid- 

 ered as a constant inhabitant of the Atlantic States, from New York to 

 East Florida. As a rare visitor, it has been found even as far north as 

 Hudson's Bay, and passes the breeding season in small numbers along 

 the coasts of all the New England States, and the adjoining parts 

 of British America. Mr. Say also observed this species at Pern- 

 bino, in the forty-ninth parallel. Ancient natural heronries of 

 this species occur in the deep maritime swamps of North and 

 South Carolina: similar associations for breeding exist also in tho 

 lower parts of New Jersey. Their favorite and long frequented 

 resorts are usually dark and enswamped solitudes or boggy lakes, 

 grown up with tall cedars, and entangled with an undergrowth of 

 bushes and Kalmia laurels. These recesses defy the reclaiming hand 

 of cultivation, and present the same gloomy and haggard landscape 

 they did to the aborgines of the forest, who, if they existed, mightj 

 still pursue through the tangled mazes of these dismal swamps, the 

 retreating bear, and timorous deer. From the bosom of these choked) 

 lakes, and arising out of the dark and pitchy bog, maybe seen large 

 clumps of the tall Cypress (Cupressus disticha^ like the innumerable 

 connecting columns of the shady mangrove, for sixty or more feet 

 rising without a branch, and their spreading tops, blending together,, 

 form a canopy so dense as almost to exclude the light from beneath 

 their branches. In the tops of the tallest of these trees, the warv 

 Herons, associated to the number of ten or fifteen pairs, construct 

 their nests, each one in the top of a single tree ; these are large, formed 

 of coarse sticks, and merely lined with smaller twigs. The eggs, 

 generally four, are somewhat larger than those of the lien, of a light 

 greenish blue, and destitute of spots. The young are seen abroad 

 about the middle of May, and become extremely fat and full grown 

 before they make any effective attempts to fly. They raise but a 

 single brood ; and when disturbed at their eyries, fly over the spot, 

 sometimes honking almost like a goose, and at others uttering a 

 loud, hollow, and guttural grunt. 



Fish is the principal food of the Great Heron, and for this purpose 

 like an experienced angler, he often waits for that condition of the 

 tide, which best suits his experience and instinct. At such times, they 

 are seen slowly sailing out from their inland breeding haunts, during 

 the most silent and cool period of the summer's day, selecting usually, 

 such shallow inlets as the ebbing tide leaves bare, or accessible to his 

 watchful and patient mode of prowling ; here, wading to the knees, 

 lie stands motionless amidst the timorous fry, till some victim coming 

 within the compass of his wily range, is as instantly seized by the 

 powerful bill of the Heron, as if it were the balanced poniard of the 

 assassin, or the unerring pounce of the Osprey. If large, the fish ia 

 beaten to death, and commonly swallowed with the head descending 

 as if to avoid any obstacle arising from the reversion of the fins 01 



