THE DITTERN. 271 
marking, sufficiently prove them to be two distinct 
species, although hitherto, the present has been classed 
as a mere variety of the European Bittern. These birds, 
we are informed, visit Severn river at Hudson’s Bay, 
about the beginning of June; make their nests in 
swamps, laying four cinereous green eggs among the 
long grass. The young are said to be, at first, black. 
‘“‘ These birds, when disturbed, rise with a hollow kwa, 
and are then easily shot down as they fly heavily. Like 
other night birds, their sight is most acute during the 
evening twilight; but their hearing is, at all times, 
exquisite. 
“The American Bittern is twenty-seven inches long, 
and three feet four inches in extent; from the point of 
the bill to the extremity of the toes, it measures three 
feet ; the bill is four inches long; the upper mandible 
black ; the lower greenish-yellow ; lares and eyelids, yel- 
low; irides, bright yellow; upper part of the head, flat, and 
_remarkably depressed; the plumage there is of a deep 
blackish brown, long behind and on the neck, the general 
color of which is a yellowish brown, shaded with darker ; 
this long plumage of the neck the bird can throw forward 
at will, when irritated, so as to give him a more formi- 
dable appearance; throat, whitish, streaked with deep 
brown: from the posterior and lower part of the auricu- 
lars,a broad patch of deep black passes diagonally across 
the neck, a distinguished characteristic of this species ; 
the back is deep brown, barred, and mottled with innu- 
