392 Ardeidce. 



I have watched it for hours on the mud-flats and sandbanks of 

 the Nile, as it walked with majestic step a very king amidst the 

 smaller Waders, striding about with commanding air, strutting 

 as if in self-conscious superiority, arching its long neck and 

 demeaning itself as the very queen of the shallows ; but the most 

 complete monograph on any bird with which I am acquainted is 

 the story of the Crane in its breeding-place in Lapland, as detailed 

 by my lamented friend, the late Mr. John Wolley, in the Ibis,* a 

 most perfect description of this now uncommon bird. When 

 migrating, as all known species of Cranes do, it collects in large 

 flocks, and is said to fly at a great height, and to keep up a 

 perpetual hoarse scream, or trumpet-like shrill cry, which, owing 

 to the very remarkable structure of the windpipe, is louder than 

 the note of any other bird, and which may be heard when the 

 birds are far out of sight. Mr. James Waylen has most obligingly 

 furnished me with the following interesting anecdote of a Wilt- 

 shire Crane: 'In 1783 it was recorded in the Salisbury paper 

 that a gentleman shot a Crane, on whose leg was found a piece 

 of copper which he himself had attached in the year 1767, after 

 having caught the same bird by means of a hawk : the copper 

 plate bore his initials, and the date 1767.' I am afraid that I 

 have no more modern instance of the occurrence of the Crane in 

 Wiltshire. 



The English word ' Crane ' is derived from the Latin grus, and 

 that, as it seems, from the Greek yepavos, which in all probability 

 arose from the cry of the bird. So in France it is Grue cendree; 

 and in Germany Aschgrauer Kranich, 'Ash-coloured Crane;' in 

 Italy, Grue; in Spain, Grulla; in Portugal, Grou; but in Sweden 

 Trana. 



ARDEID.E (THE HERONS). 



Though wholly incapable of swimming, the various species 

 which compose this large family may certainly be ranked as 

 Water-birds, so entirely are their haunts and habits aquatic. Con- 

 spicuous for the excessive length of their legs, and for their long 

 Ibis, vol. i., pp. 191-198. 



