IX 
THE HERON: A FEATHERED NOTABLE 
Tue bird-watcher’s life is an endless succession of 
surprises. Almost every day he appears fated to 
witness some habit, some action, which he had 
never seen or heard of before, and will perhaps 
never see again. Who but Waterton ever beheld 
herons hovering like gulls over the water, attracted 
by the fish swimming near the surface? And who, 
I wonder, except myself ever saw herons bathing 
and wallowing after the manner of beasts, not 
birds? At all events I do not remember any 
notice of such a habit in any account of the heron 
I have read; and I have read many. At noon, 
one hot summer day, I visited Sowley Pond, which 
has a heronry near it on the. Hampshire coast; and 
peeping through the trees on the bank I spied 
five herons about twenty yards from the margin 
bathing in a curious way among the floating poa 
grass, where the water was about two feet deep or 
more. All were quietly resting in different positions 
in the water—one was sitting on his knees with 
head and neck and shoulders out of it, another 
was lying on one side with one half-open wing 
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