GREAT HERON. 
295 
one which was shot in the upper pajrts of New Hampshire, was described 
to me as a great curiosity. Many of their breeding places occur in 
both Carolinas, chiefly in the vicinity of the sea. In the lower parts 
of New Jersey they have also their favorite places for building, and 
rearing their young. These are generally in the gloomy solitudes of 
the tallest cedar swamps, where, if unmolested, they continue annually 
to breed for many years. These swamps are from half a mile to a mile 
in breadth, and sometimes five or six in length, and appear as if they 
occupied the former channel of some choked up river, stream, lake, 
or arm of the sea. The appearance they present to a stranger is 
singular. A front of tall and perfectly straight trunks, rising to the 
height of fifty or sixty feet without a limb, and crowded in every direc- 
tion, their tops so closely woven together as to shut out the day, 
spreading the gloom of perpetual twilight below. On a near approach 
they are found to rise out of the water, which from the impregnation of 
the fallen leaves and roots of the cedars, is of the color of brandy. 
Amidst this bottom of congregated springs, the ruins of the former 
forest lie piled in every state of confusion. The roots, prostrate logs, 
and in many places the water, are covered with green mantling moss, 
while an undergrowth of laurel, fifteen or twenty feet high, intersects 
every opening so completely, as to render a passage through laborious 
and harassing beyond description ; at every step you either sink to the 
knees, clamber over fallen timber, squeeze yourself through between 
the stubborn laurels, or plunge to the middle in ponds made by the 
uprooting of large trees, and which the green moss concealed from 
observation. In calm weather the silence of death reigns in these 
dreary regions ; a few interrupted rays of light shoot across the gloom ; 
and unless for the occasional hollow screams of the Herons, and the 
melancholy chirping of one or two species of small birds, all is silence, 
solitude and desolation. When a breeze rises, at first it sighs mourn- 
fully through the tops ; but as the gale increases, the tall mast-like 
cedars wave like fishing poles, and rubbing against each other, produce 
a variety of singular noises, that, with the help of a little imagination, 
resemble shrieks, groans, growling of bears, wolves and such like 
comfortable music. 
On the tops of the tallest of these cedars the Herons construct their 
nests, ten or fifteen pair sometimes occupying a particular part of the 
swamp. The nests are large, formed of sticks, and lined with smaller 
twigs ; each occupies the top of a single tree. The eggs are generally 
four, of an oblong pointed form, larger than those of a hen, and of a 
light greenish blue without any spots. The young are produced about 
the middle of May, and remain on the trees until they are full as heavy 
as the old ones, being extremely fat, before they are able to fly. They 
breed but once in the season. If disturbed in their breeding place, 
