A MODERN HERONRY. 
159 
of grey, in the form of streaks or elongated spots. The 
feathers which cover the wings are long and silky, as are 
those of a tuft which depends from the lower part of the 
neck covering the breast, and the slate-coloured crest-fea- 
thers flow back so far as nearly to touch the neck at its 
connection with the shoulders ; a strange shy bird, ungrace- 
ful in its movements, with a harsh voice, and to man, 
unsocial habits ; it will stand for hours in the water with 
its head drawn close in, ready to dart upon its finny or 
slimy prey, and transfix it with its sharp beak. A real 
hermit of the woods and streams, consorting not even with 
its own kith and kin, except during the breeding season, 
when it becomes lively, noisy, and gregarious, forming those 
communities of birds called Heronries, which were once 
guarded and preserved with jealous care for the sake of the 
sport which they afforded in hawking, and which still exist 
in many parts of the country, although the royal game of 
hunting Herons to death with trained Hawks and Falcons 
has happily fallen into disuse. 
Heronry, says a recent writer in the ''Illustrated London News," 
is a word closely associated in the mind of a genuine Londoner with 
regions indefinitely distant, or scenes of palatial grandeur strange to 
the present age. But these imaginations originate in his not knowing 
a hawk from a heronshaw. Heronries are still close neighbours of 
the metropolis ; and the gallant " Hearon-sewy " may often be seen 
traversing the ocean of the London smoke. We have been led into 
these remarks, by what, to ourselves^ was a discovery — the existence 
of a small but very complete heronry in the venerable park of Cob- 
ham, near Gravesend. Walking, on a recent summer's day near the 
beautiful forest which begirts the mausoleum of the Darnleys, in 
that sylvan region, we were startled by the loud, yelping cry peculiar 
to the ArdeidcB, and, to our surprise, discovered, immediately over 
head, a busy colony of genuine "three year olders" busily employed 
in tending their voracious families. The antiquity of the place, and 
the baronial importance of the Cobhams, were at once determined 
things. The sword of De Warrenc, despite the proximity of G-raves- 
end, could not have more quickly settled the question. Visions of 
*'merrie Englande" passed before us. We thought of the days 
when an Archbishop of York graced his table with 400 heronshawes ; 
and of the years, too, in which the week's wages of the architect of 
Windsor Castle and the price of a single heron were represented by 
the same coin — a twelvepenny piece for the buildefl^and a twelve 
for the bird. The brave courtings, also, in which the catching of a 
