THE NIGHT HERON. 409 



nests was not of the pleasantest, we limited our investiga- 

 tions to the securing of a few of the most recently laid 



eggs. 



The eggs of the Night Heron are laid about the 20th of 

 May. They are visually four in number, and their general 

 form is an elongated ovoidal. In a great number of speci- 

 mens, the color is generally bluish-green, sometimes a light 

 pea-green or greenish-yellow. Their dimensions vary from 

 2.15 by 1.50 inch to 2.05 by 1.40 incli. About the latter 

 part of August, the young birds are found in deep woods, 

 and by many are esteemed as excellent eating, as they are 

 plump and fat. They leave for the South early in October. 



Mr. William Endicott, who visited the same heronry, gives 

 the following description of it : '• The first thing which 

 called the attention of the explorer was the whiteness of 

 the ground, owing to the excrements of the birds ; the air 

 hot and close was loaded with its keen, penetrating odor ; 

 the fine particles of it, floating in the air and coming in con- 

 tact with the perspiring body, made one smart all over. 

 There was also a smell of the decaying fish which lay 

 around ; some dropped by accident by the old birds (who, 

 I believe, never stoop to pick them up again), and much 

 more disgorged when their tree was assailed. These fish 

 were mostly such as could not be obtained in the ponds and 

 rivers. I once saw a piece of a pout, and once a fragment 

 of a pickerel, but most of the remains were those of herrings. 

 The light-green eggs were usually four in number ; but I 

 have seen five and six repeatedly, and once seven, in a nest. 

 The young are downy, soft, helpless things at first, but soon 

 gain strength enough to climb to the upper branches, where 

 they hang on with bill and claws, and are fed by their 

 parents till nearly full-grown." 



