cuvier's description. 
161 
The Heron seeks everywhere the neighbourhood of lakes, of rivers,, 
and of lands intersected by water. Almost always solitary, it 
remains, for hours together, immoveable in the same spot. When it 
puts itself in motion to watch, upon their passage, and more nearly, 
the frogs and fishes, which constitute its chief aliment, it enters into 
the water above the knee, with its head between the legs, and in 
this position, after having patiently awaited the moment of seizing 
its prey, it suddenly unfolds its long neck, and pierces its victim 
with its bill. It has been ascertained that it swallows frogs entire, 
for their bones are found in its stomach unbroken. In time of 
dearth, and when the water is covered with ice, it approaches run- 
ning streams, and hot springs, where it is said to feed on the water- 
lentil, and other small plants. But it frequently exposes itself to 
perish, rather than seek a milder climate. In the different seasons 
of the year, it constantly appears so nielancholy and insensible, that 
it will remain alone and exposed in the worst weather, on some 
stump in the midst of an inundated meadow, while the blongios (a 
smaller kind of heron) takes shelter in the thick herbage, and the 
bittern in the midst of the reeds. 
The Herons, which unite to their sad and uniform existence all the 
torments of perpetual fear and inquietude, are not accustomed to 
take flight, except at night, and for the purpose of betaking them- 
selves into the woods of thick and lofty foliage in the neighbourhood, 
and from which they return before the dawn of day. Then it is that 
their sharp and unpleasant scream is heard, which might be com- 
pared to that of a goose, were it not shorter and more melancholy. 
In the day-time, they fly away to a great distance from the sight of 
man, and when attacked by the eagle or the falcon, they endeavour 
to escape by rising into the air, and getting above them. The wings 
of the heron strike the air in an equal and regulated motion, and 
this uniform flight raises and carries its body to such an elevation, 
that, at a distance, nothing is perceptible except the wings, which are 
at length lost sight of in the region of the clouds. 
A correspondent of the ' Magazine of Natural Plistory,' 
in a list of birds that were collected near Dartford in Kent, 
mentions the following extraordinary fact : — ^Ardea major, 
Heron. A fine full-plumaged bird. I particularly enu- 
merate this bird (which was run down by a boy, and cap- 
tured on Bexley marshes) from finding in his stomach a 
very large-sized, mature male ivater-rat. It had been lately 
swallowed, occupying even to distension (with portions of 
partly-digested fish) the ventricles of the Heron. The 
only apparent injury to the animal was a puncture, made 
by the beak of the bird, in the frontal part of the skull, 
by which the life was destroyed.' 
L 
