ARDEA GARZETTA. 35 



men from which the above description is taken was shot 

 among some tall sedge up a river near Brunai. 



Ardea garzetta (?). 

 Kanawy putih (Malay name). 



Young — white ; some of the feathers on the neck, and a few on 

 the lower parts of the body, especially about the lower covers and 

 thighs, are irregularly marked, and speckled with brownish black ; 

 this, however, appears to arise from the specimen being in immature 

 plumage, as in some places, over one ear, for example, there is a 

 decided patch of this colour, while the other ear is pure white ; the 

 long feathers of the crest are also wanting, showing that the bird is 

 not in full plumage ; beak black, except the basal half of the lower 

 mandible, which is yellowish white ; tarsus black ; feet greenish 

 black. 



Length, from the tip of the bill to the tip of the tail, 22 inches. 



„ of bill from gape, 3 inches 9 lines. 



„ of bill from front, 3 inches. 



„ of wings, 10^ inches. 



„ of tail, 3 inches 10 lines. 



„ of tarsus, 4 inches. 



„ of middle toe, 2 inches 11 lines. 



„ of hallux, 1 inch 8 lines. 



„ of thigh bare above the knee joint, 2 inches 2 lines. 



Besides the Malay name given above, these Egrets are 

 commonly called " padi birds," from their frequenting the 

 rice-fields; they feed on the mud left by the tide, running 

 about very fast with their heads down : they roost together 

 in large numbers on trees, and are said to build in high jungle, 

 though from the following specimen of Malay superstition, 

 which, though perhaps rather out of place in a work on natural 

 history, from its poetical character and its resemblance to the 

 fairy legends of our own country we are induced to insert, it 

 would appear that their nests are not easily found, or often 

 seen ; the legend was translated from the Malay language by 

 Mr. Motley, and is almost in the very words in which it was 

 told him. It runs as follows : — 



" It is said that but one mortal has ever seen the nests and 

 eggs of the Kanawy putih, for they do not, like other birds, 

 breed in the swamps and jungle of our visible world, but about 

 the houses of certain happy invisible beings called the Orang 

 Ka-benar-an or ' people of truthfulness.' They are a race of 



D 2 



