68 ON SUSSEX HERONRIES. 



which are dropped." Perhaps also for the young ones, of which thirteen or 

 fourteen were blown out last year. 



It would appear that the Heron does not condescend to pick up a fish 

 when lost, in which respect it resembles the Fish-hawk, or Osprey, of 

 America (^Falco haliceetus). Wilson mentions that one let fall a fine flounder, 

 which served a whole family for dinner (vol. ii. p. 112). I say "American 

 Fish-hawk," because the ornithologists of England and America are divided 

 as to there being one or two species in the respective countries, and I always 

 listen to American naturalists. These Herons drop a great many fish. 



The above is a case of foxes eating fish. In a book on the Country 

 between the Danube and Black Sea, by Henry C. Barkley, p. 82, we find : — 



" On one occasion R and I determined to dig out an earth, with 



the hope of getting a young fox to tame. First the earth ran winding in for 

 about five yards, where there was a bolt-hole ; and about three yards further 

 on was an oven-shaped room, as big as a large hamper, the sides and floor 

 of which were swept quite clean and free from dust. There were several 

 rooms at the sides of the passages, in one of which we found the following 

 provisions, all quite fresh — a leveret, a turtledove, seven roach, and three 

 goose's eggs. We were greatly astonished at the time ; and to this day it 

 remains a puzzle to me how the foxes caught the fish, and how they could 

 carry such large eggs. The eggs were unbroken ; and the fish had not a 

 mark upon them. We took them all home and eat them. I take it this was 

 the first time a man had taken a dinner from a fox ! " 



The foxes probably obtained the fish in the same way that the Sowden 

 ones o:et theirs*. 



&" 



* Foxes are not the only quadrupeds whicli assail breeding birds. We find the same done 

 by bears, badgers, wolves, &c. ; for Colonel Prjevalsky says of Ciconia boyciana {cf. antea, p. 50) : — 

 "A great many nests of the present species are destroyed by Tibet bears [Ursus thibetanus), who 

 climb up to the nests and eat the young birds." Also Jacques Cartier, the discoverer of Canada, in 

 his 'Voyages' (1534-1542), states, of the Polar bears {Ursus maritimus), that they will swim to an 



