106 PEALE’S EGRET HERON. 
these retreats are celebrated both in America and Europe. The 
naturalist whose courage and perseverance enable him to pene¬ 
trate the swamps, and a thousand difficulties that surround one of 
these recesses, and render them nearly inaccessible, is amply 
repaid by the astonishing spectacle he witnesses. He finds every 
branch, every fork, the top of every bush covered with the nests 
of these birds ; and the ear is stunned with the cries and flapping 
of the wings of the alarmed multitude. The parents, and such of 
the young as can fly, at once depart, their numbers obscuring the 
sky: but their attachment for their offspring overcoming their 
fears, the parents soon return to their defence, and boldly attack 
any enemy, so that even the blows of sticks, or the report of the 
fatal gun has no terror for them. Their nests are made with 
sticks, and lined with wool; but if they find a nest already made, 
they do not take the pains to build a new one. Their young are 
as voracious and hard to satisfy as themselves. 
The Egret Herons are entirely of a snowy whiteness, without 
any coloured markings on the plumage whatever. We even 
exclude from them the Jlrdeci russata that visits occasionally the 
south of Europe, and possesses when adult in the greatest degree 
the long flowing ornamental plumes. This, with the rcilloides , 
speciosa of Java, &c., we consider as forming a group equivalent 
in rank to Egret, and we apply to it Boie’s name of Buphus. 
Our second subgenus, Botaurus, including the Bittern, Night 
Herons, and other groups of authors, is characterized by the bill 
being hardly longer than the head, much compressed, higher 
than broad, with the upper mandible somewhat curved. Their 
legs are comparatively short, and the naked space on the tibia 
restricted : their neck is rather short, thickly and closely covered 
with long, broad, and loose erectile feathers, and merely downy 
above: their body is comparatively plump, even fleshy, and 
sometimes good eating. They are chiefly nocturnal, and haunt 
