CHAPTEE I. 
THE GREAT WHITE HERON 
(Egretta alba). 
“ The moping Heron, motionless and stiff, 
That on a stone, as silently and stilly, 
Stood, an apparent sentinel, as if 
To guard the water-lily.” 
Thomas Hood. 
Michelet, in speaking of the Heron, calls it “ the 
type of melancholy, the dreamer of the swamp, a decayed 
gentleman of quality.” I, for my part, have during my 
travels repeatedly met with and observed close upon 
twenty different species of Herons under various circum¬ 
stances, and the result has ever failed to show me 
anything like melancholy or dreaminess in connection 
with any one member of the entire family; on the con¬ 
trary, Herons, however much they may have annoyed 
me by their wariness, always pleased me by their 
graceful form and habits of life. I incline more to the 
opinion of Naum aim, who, in speaking of the bird that we 
are about to describe, says that it is one, which by the 
extreme delicacy and purity of its plumage, as well as by 
its conspicuous size, far surpasses all other European 
members of the Heron family. The spectacle of numbers 
of these grand birds, as seen in the far distance, is one 
