STRANGE CREATURES WITH STRANGE VOICES. 97 



possibly considers the noise too unattractive for a 

 prompt response. Indeed, it is on record that the 

 bird has " pumped " for an hour. The sucking sound 

 of a pump, I might explain, is considered by some 

 the nearest approach to this strange creature's un- 

 musical notes. 



If we are near enough to the swamp where the 

 bittern stands, we will see a bird, about twenty-four 

 inches high, with a slate-gray head and neck — the 

 latter black-streaked — and a brown back, standing 

 upright and motionless. It really takes quite a sharp 

 eye to separate the bird from his surroundings. 

 When he moves, his deliberate and stealthy steps are 

 hardly perceptible ; but as soon as he opens his bill 

 to speak his strange actions attract our notice and 

 enlist our sympathy. 



His crop is seemingly distended with air which he 

 has swallowed in a most noisy fashion ; every time he 

 takes a gulp of it the head is thrown upward and then 

 forward, the body is violently convulsed, and, with 

 every feather pufEed out, one imagines the wretched 

 creature is at his last gasp with a torturing fishbone 

 in his throat. 



But no ; he is only singing his chant d^ammi/r, or 

 amusing himself with a bit of everyday vocal ath- 

 letics. Mr. "William Brewster, of Cambridge, de- 

 scribes the sound as a trisyllabic one, thus : Pump-er- 



