50 
GREAT HERON. 
involved in error and obscurity,* I have taken more than com- 
mon pains to present a faithful portrait of it in this place ; and 
to add to that every fact and authentic particular relative to its 
manners, whichmaybe necessary to the elucidation of the subject. 
The great heron is a constant inhabitant of the Atlantic 
coast, from New York to Florida ; in deep snows and severe 
weather seeking the open springs of the cedar and cypress 
swamps, and the muddy inlets occasionally covered by the 
tides. On the higher inland parts of the country, beyond the 
mountains, they are less numerous ; and one which was shot 
in the upper parts 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 
advantage of their long legs and neck, renders them difficult of approach, un- 
less under extensive cover. When watching their prey they may be said to resem- 
ble a cat, prying anxiously about the sides of the ditches, lake, or stream, but as 
soon as the least motion or indication of a living creature is seen, they are fixed 
and ready to make a dart almost always unerring. Mouse, frog, or fish, even 
rails, and the young of the larger water fowl, are transfixed, and being carried 
to the nearest bank or dry ground, are immediately swallowed, always with the 
head downwards. Their prey appears to be often, if not always, transfixed, — 
a mode of capture not generally known, but admirably fitted to secure one as 
vigilant as the aggressor. One or two of the wild and beautiful islets on Loch 
Awe are occupied as breeding places by the herons, where I have climbed to 
many of their nests, all well supplied with ti’out and eels invariably pierced or 
stuck through. None of the species breed on the ground, and it is a curious and 
rather anomalous circumstance, that the ardeadse, the ibis, and some allied birds, 
which are decidedly waders, and formed for walking, should build and roost on 
trees, where their motions are all awkward, and where they seem as if constantly 
placed in a situation contrary to their habits or abilities. A heronry, during 
the breeding season, is a curious and interesting, as well as picturesque object. — 
Ed. 
* Latham says of this species, that “all the upper parts of the body, the belly, 
tail, and legs, are brown and this description has been repeated by every sub- 
sequent compiler. Buffon, with his usual eloquent absurdity, describes the 
heron as “ exhibiting the picture of wretchedness, anxiety, and indigence ; con- 
demned to struggle perpetually with misery and want ; sickened with the rest- 
less cravings of a famished appetite;” a description so ridiculously untrue, that, 
were it possible for these birds to comprehend it, it would excite the risibility of 
the whole tribe. 
