GREAT WHITE HERON. 
11 
are plainly to be perceived, extending several inches beyond 
the common plumage. 
The great white heron breeds in several of the extensive 
cedar swamps in the lower parts of New Jersey. Their nests 
are built on the trees, in societies ; the structure and materials 
exactly similar to those of the snowy heron, but larger. The 
eggs are usually four, of a pale-blue colour. In the months of 
July and August, the young make their first appearance in the 
meadows and marshes, in parties of twenty or thirty together. 
The large ditches with which the extensive meadows below 
Philadelphia are intersected, are regularly, about that season, 
visited by flocks of those birds ; these are frequently shot, but 
the old ones are too sagacious to be easily approached. Their 
food consists of frogs, lizards, small fish, insects, seeds of the 
splatterdock (a species of nymphse), and small water-snakes. 
They will also devour mice and moles, the remains of such 
having been at different times found in their stomachs. 
The long plumes of these birds have at various periods been 
in great request on the continent of Europe, particularly in 
France and Italy, for the purpose of ornamenting the female 
head-dress. When dyed of various colours, and tastefully 
fashioned, they form a light and elegant duster and musquitto 
brush. The Indians prize them for ornamenting their hair, 
or top-knot ; and I have occasionally observed these people 
wandering through the market-place of New Orleans, with 
bunches of those feathers for sale. 
The great white heron measures five feet from the extremi- 
ties of the wings, and three feet six inches from the tip of the 
bill to the end of the tail ; the train extends seven or eight 
inches farther. This train is composed of a great number of 
long, thick, tapering shafts, arising from the lower part of the 
shoulders, and thinly furnished on each side with fine flowing 
hair-like threads, of several inches in length, covering the 
lower part of the back, and falling gracefully over the tail, 
which it entirely conceals. The whole plumage is of a snowy 
whiteness, except the train, which is slightly tinged with yel- 
