398 Field-notes on the Birds of Denmark. 
of excessive drought, wet, or cold than from all the perse- 
cution of man; but in the spot which we visited there were 
not more than from sixty to seventy pairs, or, as Mr. Seebohm 
thinks, a hundred. These were all breeding close together, 
in a spot surrounded and concealed by willows and alders, 
so that we had some trouble to find it, being only guided by 
the flight of the birds and the smell. Some of the nests were 
placed on alder bushes, as much as three or four feet above the 
marsh, but the majority of them were on the ground. The 
eggs numbered one or two in each, and several were dropped 
about outside and beneath the nests. There were also one 
or two nests at a little distance from the main breeding- 
place; but the birds seemed thoroughly gregarious in their 
habits, and kept together in a flock soaring overhead or at a 
little distance to leeward as long as we were on the ground. 
One Heron’s nest was on a low willow tree near the Spoon- 
bills, which may have belonged to a Purple Heron, as I 
saw that bird in the vicinity, and none of Ardea cinerea, 
which by this time would have large young ones; neither 
have I ever seen the Common Heron breed on bushes when 
large trees were in the immediate neighbourhood. After 
leaving the Spoonbills we visited the many breeding-places of 
the Cormorants, at a distance of 300 or 400 yards, where we 
found about 200 to 300 nests packed together as closely as 
possible, and occupying, as nearly as we could estimate, 
about one square yard each. ‘They were of various heights, 
some a mere platform of sticks on the ground, and others at 
least two or three feet in height. The whole of the vegetation 
on and around this spot was trodden down and killed by the 
copious droppings of the Cormorants, which covered the entire 
spot with a white deposit. The eggs, which were one or two 
in number, seemed to average much smaller in size, and to 
have less of the chalky substance on the shell, than is the 
case in Scotland or England. 
Though accompanied by a gentleman from the Zoological 
Gardens at Amsterdam, who, through the Director’s kind- 
ness, was good enough to act as our guide on this occasion, 
we were unable to ascertain any particulars about the habits 
