NATURAL HISTORY. 
94 
already provided for them. This they .usually enlarge and 
line within, driving off the original possessors, should they 
happen to renew their fruitless claims. 
The heron is said to be a very long lived bird ; by Mr. 
Keysler’s account it may Exceed sixty years; and bv a recent 
instance of one that was taken in Holland, by a hawk be- 
longing to the Stadtholder, its longevity is again confirmed, 
the bird having a silver plate fastened to one leg, with an in- 
scription, importing that, it had been struck by the elector of 
Cologne’s hawks thirty-five years before. 
Of all the species which have been mentioned above, only 
three appear to be known in England, the common heron, 
which we have been describing, and which is blue, the white 
heron, and the bittern, or mire-drum. 
Those who have walked in an evening by the sedgy sides 
of unfrecpiented rivers, must remember a variety of notes from 
different water-fowl : the loud scream of the wild goose, the 
croaking of the mallard, the whining of the lapwing, and the 
tremulous neighing of the jack snipe. But of all thole sounds, 
there is none so dismally hollow as the booming of the bittern. 
It is impossible for words to give those, who have not heard 
this evening-call, an adequate idea of its solemnity. It is like 
the interrupted bellowing of a bull, but hollovver and louder, 
and is heard at a mile’s distance, as if issuing from some for- 
midable being that resided at. the bottom of the waters. 
The bird, however, that produces this terrifying sound is 
not so big as a heron, with a weaker bill, and not above four 
inches long. It differs from the heron chiefly in its colour, 
which is in general of a palish yellow, spotted and barred with 
black. Its wind-pipe is fitted to produce the sound for which 
it is remarkable; the lower part of it dividing into the lungs, 
is supplied with a thin loose membrane, that can be filled with 
4 large body ot air, and exploded at pleasure. These bellow- 
ing explosions are chiefly heard from the beginning of spring 
to the end of autumn ; and, however awful they may seem to 
us, are the calls to courtship, or connubial felicity. 
This bird, though of the heron kind, is yet neither so des- 
tructive nor so voracious. It is a retired, timorous animal, 
concealing itself in the midst of reeds and marshy places, and 
living upon frogs, insects, and vegetables ; anil though so 
nearly resembling the heron in figure, yet differing much in 
manners and appetites. It lays its eggs in a sedgy margin, 
or amidst a tuft of rushes, and composes its simple habitation 
of sedges, the leaves of water plants, and dry rushes. It lays 
generally seven or eight eggs of an ash-green colour, and in 
three days leads its little ones to their food. 
