GREAT HERON. 
33 
On the eighteenth of May I examined, both externally and by 
dissection, five specimens of the Great Heron, all in complete plu- 
mage, killed in a cedar swamp near the nead of Tuckahoe river, in 
Cape May county. New Jersey. In this case the females could 
not be mistaken, as some of the eggs were nearly ready for exclu- 
sion. 
Length of the Great Heron four feet four inches from the 
point of the bill to the end of the tail, and to the bottom of the 
feet five feet four inches ; extent six feet; bill eight inches long, 
and one inch and a quarter in width, of a yellow color, in some 
blackish on the ridge, extremely sharp at the point, the edges also 
sharp, and slightly serrated near the extremity ; space round the 
eye from the nostril, a light purplish blue ; irides orange, bright- 
ening into yellow where they join the pupil ; forehead and middle 
of the crown white, passing over the eye ; sides of the crown and 
hind-head deep slate or bluish black, and elegantly crested, the 
two long tapering black feathers being full eight inches in length ; 
chin, cheeks, and sides of the head, white for several inches; throat 
white, thickly streaked with double rows of black ; rest of the neck 
brownish ash, from the lower part of which shoot a great number 
of long narrow pointed white feathers that spread over the breast 
and reach nearly to the thighs ; under these long plumes the breast 
itself, and middle of the belly are of a deep blackish slate, the latter 
streaked with white ; sides blue ash, vent white ; thighs and ridges 
of the wings a dark purplish rust color ; whole upper parts of the 
wings, tail, and body, a fine light ash, the last ornamented with 
a profusion of long narrow white tapering feathers, originating on 
the shoulders or upper part of the back, and falling gracefully over 
the wings ; primaries very dark slate, nearly black ; naked thighs 
brownish yellow; legs brownish black, tinctured with yellow, and 
netted with seams of whitish ; in some the legs are nearly black. 
Little difference could be perceived between the plumage of the 
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VOL. VIII. 
