INTEODrrOTIOlf. 



37 



o^ coasts, at least in our Northern Counties, searching the popls 

 left at low water for crabs, shrimps, or other small marine 

 creatures. 



Amongst foreign allied forms may be mentioned the Night- 

 heron, which occasionally visits this country ; as also, though 

 very rarely, does the beautiful Little Egret (Ardea garzetta) and 

 the great White Egret, which breeds regularly in Southern 



Fig. 36. 



The Sun-bittern {Wurypyga helias). 



Eussia and the Lower Danube. The Bittern (Botawus stel- 

 laris), a shy bird, noted for its peculiar guttural, booming cry, 

 now only a winter visitant to England, is an example of a shghtly 

 different form. Of Herons and Bitterns there are altogether 

 about eighty-two different species. The Bird known as the 

 Sun-bittern {Blurypyga helias) is very unlike the true Bitterns. 

 It has a very thin neck, and is marked in a pecuhar way with 

 transverse stripes of white, brown, and black, so that, once 



