HERON. 67 



front pale yellow, with broad streaks of chestnut, usually one web 

 of each colour; the feathers of the breast long, and chocolate brown, 

 glossed with purple, and margined with yellow ; belly and sides the 

 same, but less bright, the brown marks becoming speckled ; vent 

 yellowish white; back and scapulars chocolate brown, with paler 

 margins, minutely speckled, and glossed with purple; wing coverts 

 dull yellow; quills and greater wing coverts dusky lead-colour, 

 slightly tipped with brown ; tertials and tail like the back ; toes 

 long, the middle claw slightly serrated. 



This was killed in Dorsetshire; another near Cliefden, as men- 

 tioned by Mr. Pennant ; a third shot in Oxfordshire, in 1798 ; and a 

 fourth shot from the bough of a tree, on which it perched, near St. 

 Asaph, in Flintshire, in 1810. 



It also inhabits Germany, according to M. Bechstein, who seems 

 to think it allied to the Common Night Heron. 



28— OBSCURE NIGHT HERON. 



Ardea obscura, Ind. Orn. ii. 679. It. Posseg. 24. ii. 

 Obscure Heron, Gen. Sy?i. Sup. ii. 300. 



SIZE and habit of the Bittern. Bill rather bent, blackish green; 

 on the hindhead a dependent crest of one feather ; forehead, crown, 

 and nape, dull chestnut; back and wing coverts the same, with a 

 gold green gloss ; neck behind ferruginous chestnut ; before, with 

 the breast and belly, chestnut, spotted longitudinally with white and 

 ferruginous; quills dull chestnut, tipped with white; tail chestnut; 

 legs short, greenish. 



Inhabits Sclavonia, about Possega. We have retained several 



of the above as different in species, though with much uncertainty ; 



especially as the Night Heron is subject to vary much in the various 



stages of life ; and hence, perhaps, may lead into the supposition of 



more than one being distinct, when in reality they are Varieties only 



of the same original. 



K 2 



