442 THE LIVING ANIMALS OF THE WORLD 



. by J. T. N, 



YOUNG HERONS FOURTEEN DAYS OLD IN NEST 



Photographed in the top of a pine-tree bo feet from the ground 



approached. In the nests with young 

 there was a great difference in age 

 and size, one being about a day 

 or so old, and the oldest nearly 

 ready to leave the nest — some two 

 or three weeks old — so that evidently 

 the birds lay their four eggs at 

 considerable intervals, and begin to 

 sit on depositing the first. After 

 wandering about, a matter of diffi- 

 culty on account of the mud, we 

 found a clutch of only three eggs, 

 and one of four, which I managed 

 to blow. We also obtained two 

 clutches of eggs of the purple 

 heron, but some of the latter had 

 young." 



The Ibi.SES, though much alike 

 in form, are strangely diverse in 

 colour. One species was sacred to 

 the Ancient Egyptians. The rever- 

 ence and affection they showed to 

 this bird, above all others, is prob- 

 ably largely due to its migrating 

 habits, which obtained in that far past just as they do to-day. The naturalist Brehm says 

 on this subject: "When the Nile, after being at its lowest ebb, rose again, and the water 

 assumed a red tinge, then the ibis appeared in the land of the Pharaohs as a sure guarantee 

 that the stream — the giver and preserver of life, which the people in their profound reverence 

 raised to the rank of a god — would once again empty the well-spring of plenty o\-er the 

 thirsty land. The servant and messenger of an all-bounteous Deity commanded of a necessity 

 a reverence of a poetic and distinguished character, by reason of its importance: he too 

 must be a god." 



Another species, the GLOSSY IBIS, occurs sometimes in Britain. Perhaps the most beautiful 

 of all is the SCARLET Ibis of America, numbers of which can be seen in the Zoological 

 Gardens of London. On account of the curved, sickle-shaped bill the Ibises were at one 

 time believed to be related to the Curlews: this, however, is now known to be quite incorrect. 

 It was at one time believed that " the ibis [was] adopted as a part of the arms of the 

 town of Liverpool. This bird is termed a Liver, from which that flourishing town derived its 

 name, and is now standing on the spot where the Pool was, on the verge of which the Liver 

 was killed." The arms of the town of Liverpool, however, as IVIr. Howard Saunders points out, 

 arc " comparatively modern, and seem to have no reference to the ibis. The bird which was 

 adopted in the arms of the [extinct] Earls of Liverpool was described in a former edition of 

 'Burke's Peerage ' as a cormorant, holding in the beak a branch of seaweed. In the Plantagenet 

 seal of Liverpool, which is believed to be of the time of King John, the bird has the 

 appearance of a dove, bearing in its bill a sprig of olive, apparently intended to refer to the 

 advantages that commerce would derive from peace." 



The glossy ibis has been found breeding in colonics of thousands in Slavonia. The nests 

 are large structures formed of sticks and a few weeds, never far from the water, and many 

 even, in the colony referred to, were so near the surface that they appeared to be floating. 

 The eggs, three or four in number, are of a beautiful greenish blue. The young, while still 

 unable to fly, climb actively among the branches of the trees in which the nest is placed, 

 clinging so firmly with the feet as to be removed with difficulty. 



