THE GREAT WHITE HERON. 117 



The)' betook themselves to roosting in a beautiful arbour in his garden; 

 where at night they looked with their pure white plumage like beings of 

 another world. It is a curious fact, that the points of their bills, of which 

 an inch at least had been broken, grew again, and were as regularly shaped 

 at the end of six months as if nothing had happened to them. In the 

 evening or early in the morning, they would frequently set, like pointer 

 dogs, at moths which hovered over the flowers, and with a well-directed 

 stroke of their bill seize the fluttering insect and instantly swallow it. On 

 many occasions, they also struck at chickens, grown fowls and ducks, which 

 they would tear up and devour. Once a cat which was asleep in the 

 sunshine, on the wooden steps of the viranda, was pinned through the body 

 to the boards and killed by one of them. At last they began to pursue the 

 younger children of my worthy friend, who therefore ordered them to be 

 killed. One of them was beautifully mounted by my assistant Mr. Henry 

 Ward, and is now in the Museum of Charleston. Dr. Gibbes was obliged 

 to treat his in the same manner; and I afterwards saw one of them in his 

 collection. 



Mr. Egan kept for about a year one of these birds, which he raised from 

 the nest, and which, when well grown, was allowed to ramble along the 

 shores of Indian Key in quest of food. One of the wings had been cut, and 

 the bird was known to all the resident inhabitants, but was at last shot by 

 some Indian hunter, who had gone there to dispose of a collection of sea 

 shells. 



Some of the Herons feed on the berries of certain trees during the latter 

 part of autumn and the beginning of winter. Dr. B. Strobel observed 

 the Night Heron eating those of the "Gobolimbo," late in September at 

 Key West. 



Among the varied and contradictory descriptions of Herons, you will find 

 it alleged that these birds seize fish while on wing by plunging the head and 

 neck into the water; but this seems to me extremely doubtful. Nor, I 

 believe, do they watch for their prey while perched on trees. Another 

 opinion is, that Herons are always thin, and unfit for food. This, however, 

 is by no means generally the case in America, and I have thought these 

 birds very good eating when not too old. 



Great White Heron, Ardea occidentalism Aud. Orn. Biog., vol. iii. p. 542; vol. v. p. 596. 



Male, 54, 83. Female, 50, 75. 



Resident in the southern Florida Keys. Texas. Never seen to the east- 

 ward of Cape Florida, nor on the mainland. Common. 

 Adult Male. 



