96 AMERICAN BITTERN. 



of you, and fly off very slowly in a direct course. Their cries at such times 

 greatly resemble those of the Night and Yellow-crowned Herons. 



My friends Dr. Bachman and Mr. Nuttall, have both heard the love- 

 notes of this bird. The former says, in a letter to me, "their hoarse croak- 

 ings, as if their throats were filled with water, were heard on every. side;" 

 and the latter states that "instead of the bump or boomp of«the true Bittern, 

 their call s is something like the uncouth syllables of 'pump-au-gcih, but 

 uttered in the same low, bellowing tone." 



Dr. Bachman procured, on the 29th of April, 1833, about forty miles 

 from Charleston, individuals, in the ovaries of which he found eggs so large 

 as to induce him to believe that they would have been laid in the course of 

 a single week. Some others which were procured by him and myself within 

 nine miles of Charleston, on the 29th of March, had the eggs extremely 

 small. 



While at Passamaquody Bay, at the eastern extremity of the United 

 States, I was assured that this species bred in the vicinity; but I saw none 

 there, or in any of the numerous places examined on my way to Labrador 

 and Newfoundland. In neither of these countries did I meet with a single 

 person who was acquainted with it. 



In few other species of maritime or marsh birds have I seen so much 

 difference of size and weight, even in the same sex. Of about twenty speci- 

 mens in my possession, scarcely two correspond in the length of the bills, 

 legs, or wings. The plate before you was engraved from a drawing made 

 by my son John Woodhouse. 



American Bittern, Ardea minor, Wils. Amer. Orn., vol. vii. p. 35. 



Ardea minor, Bonap. Syn., p. 307. 



American Bittern, Ardea lentiginosa, Swains, and Rich. F. Bor. Amer., vol. ii. p. 374. 



American Bittern, Nutt. Man., vol. ii. p. 60. 



American Bittern, Ardea minor, Aud. Orn. Biog., vol. iv. p. 296. 



Male, 27, 45. Female, 26*-, 42\. 



Winter resident in the Floridas. Migrates over most part of the United 

 States. Not seen in Kentucky. Abundant in Texas. Migratory. 



Adult Male. 



Bill longer than the head, moderately stout, straight, compressed, tapering 

 to the point. Upper mandible with its dorsal line straight, towards the end 

 slightly convex and declinate, the ridge broad and rather rounded at the base, 

 gradually narrowed to the middle, then a little enlarged, and again narrowed 

 to the point, the sides bulging, towards the margin erect, the edges sharp, 

 towards the end obscurely serrated, the tip narrow, with a distinct notch or 

 sinus on each side. Nasal groove oblong, with a long depressed line in front; 



