THE ENCAMPMENT OF THE HERONS. 
BY W. E. ENDICOTT. 
AN account of an encampment of the Herons may not 
be uninteresting to such as have never seen one. The 
herony in question was in Norfolk county, Mass., until 
the present year; the birds have now, however, taken up 
their abode elsewhere, because of the almost ceaseless per- 
Secution they have suffered. The species was the Night- 
heron or Quawk (WNyctiardea Gardeni). The bird is by 
no means as graceful as the other herons in figure, being 
thicker, with a larger and clumsier neck ; as to color, how- 
ever, it is quite handsome, being white, slate, and lilac. 
It has the long nape feathers characteristic of the herons, 
rolled, as usual, into the likeness of a tube. The place 
in which they have hitherto bred is a swamp, wet, and 
difficult of access, with no turf to set foot on, owing to 
the shade of the swamp-cedars with which the quagmire 
is covered, whose slippery, mossy roots furnish a doubt- 
ful footing in some cases, and a formidable obstacle in 
others. The certainty of “slumping” through the moss, 
thereby going into the thick slime above the knees, the 
Probability of missing one’s footing, and going down, full 
length, on breast or back, and the prospect of hard and 
disagreeable work in climbing to the nests, are among the 
allurements to ‘the herons’ paradise. The birds undoubt- 
edly built there in 1861, though they were not found 
until June, 1862, when a gunner, breaking in upon their 
fancied security, shot over twenty for sport, threw them 
into a pile, and left them. | 
All, of course, who cared for natural history, who were 
few; the idlers, who were more; and many who had 
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