130 HERONS AND BITTERNS. 



heard " booming " in smaller and more accessible swampy places. Like 

 the other members of its family, it excels in standing still, and will hold 

 its head erect and motionless amid the tall grass till the watcher tires 

 of looking and pronounces the suspicious object nothing but a stick 

 after all. The Bittern's fame rests upon its vocal performance, or 

 " boom." This is sometimes exactly like the working of an old-fash- 

 ioned wooden pump, and sometimes — even with the same bird — like 

 the driving of a stake in a bog. It can be heard for a long distance. 

 The performance is best witnessed in spring, while the grass is still 

 low. That it is not so very difficult at that season to steal a march 

 upon the bird may perhaps be considered as established on the testi- 

 mony of a man who has never lived near a Bittern meadow, and yet 

 has watched the performance at much length and at near rangp. on 

 several occasions. His first experience of this kind is described some- 

 what fully in The Auk, vol. vi, page 1. The strange notes are deliv- 

 ered with equally strange contortions, as if the bird were horribly 

 nauseated, and are preceded by a succession of quick snapping or 

 gulping sounds — "hiccoughs," one observer has called them. No 

 water is employed in the operation, in spite of the circumstantial as- 

 sertions of several persons who profess to have seen the bird swallow- 

 ing and then ejecting it. — Bradford Torrey. 



191. Ardetta exilis {Gmd.). Least Bittern. Ad. S ■ — Top of the 



head, back, and tail shining black ; back of the neck chestnut-rufous ; most 

 of the greater wing-coverts and outer vanes of the secondaries darker ; lesser 

 wing-coverts and part of the greater ones buffy ; under parts, includitig under 

 tail-coverts., washed with bufty ; a blackish patch at either side of the breast. 

 Ad. 9. — .Similar, but head browner and back light, glossy umber; under 

 parts darker and more or less streaked with brownish. Itti. s . — Similar to 

 ad. i, but the back washed and tipped with chestnut; under parts darkei 

 and lightly streaked with black. Im. 9 . — similar to ad. 9 , but the back rufous, 

 margined with buffy ochraceous. L., 13-00 ; W., 4-60 ; Tar., 1-60 ; B., 1-80. 



Range. — Temperate and tropical America; breeds in North America as 

 far north as Maine, Ontario, and Manitoba; winters from southern Florida 

 southward. 



Wasliington, not very numerous S. E., May 5 to Sept. 25. Long Island, 

 common S. E., May to Sept. Sing Sing, tolerably common S. E., to Aug. 10. 

 Cambridge, rather common S. E., May 15 to Aug. 



iVfisi, of grasses, plant stems, etc., in marshes among rushes, sometimes in 

 a small bush. Eggs, three to six, pale bluish white, 1-20 x -92. 



Wet, grassy marshes such as Rail love, or reed-grown ponds that 

 Gallinules frequent, are the resorts of these retiring, secretive little 

 birds. With outstretched necks and lowered heads they make their 

 way without difficulty through the jungle of roots and stalks. Some- 

 times they climb up a slender reed, and, hanging on like Marsh Wrens, 



