“One or t’other has given in,” muttered Ben.
Looking more closely, we saw that the fisher had succeeded in getting the heron’s neck into his mouth. One bite had been sufficient. The fray was over. And after holding on a while, the victor, up to his back in water, began moving towards the shore, dragging along with him, by the neck, the body of the heron, whose great feet came trailing after at an astonishing distance behind. To see him, wet as a drowned rat, tugging up the muddy bank with his ill-omened and unsightly prey, was indeed a singular spectacle. Whatever had brought on this queer contest, the fisher had won—fairly, too, for aught I could see; and I hadn’t it in my heart to intercept his retreat. But Ben, to whom a “black cat” was particularly obnoxious, from its nefarious habit of robbing traps, had no such scruples, and, bringing up his rifle with the careless quickness of an old woodsman, fired before I could interpose a word. The fisher dropped, and after writhing and snapping a few moments, stretched out—dead.
Leaving Ben to take off its skin,—for the fur is worth a trifle,—I was strolling along the shore, when upon coming under a drooping cedar, some six or seven rods from the scene of the fight, another large heron sprang out of a clump of brambles, and stalked off with a croak of distrust. It at once occurred to me that there might be a nest here; and opening the brambles, lo, there it was, a broad, clumsy structure of coarse sticks, some two or three feet from the ground, and lined with moss and water grasses. In it, or, rather, on it, were two chicks, heron chicks, uncouth little things, with long, skinny legs and necks, and sparsely clad with tufts of gray down. And happening to glance under the nest, I perceived an egg, lodged down among the bramble-stalks. It had probably rolled out of the nest. It struck me, however, as being a very small egg from so large a bird; and having a rule in my pocket, I found it to be but two and a half inches in length by one and a half in width. It was of a dull, bluish-white color, without spots, though rather rough and uneven. I took it home as a curiosity.
On the edge of the nest I saw several small perch, a frog, and a meadow-mouse, all recently brought, though the place had a suspicious odor of carrion.
All this while the old heron had stood at a little distance away, uttering now and then an ominous croak. I could easily have shot it from where I stood, but thought the family had suffered enough for one day.
The presence of the nest accounted for the obstinacy with which the old male heron had contested the ground with the fisher.
Both old birds are said to sit by turns upon the eggs. But the nests are not always placed so near the ground as this one. Last summer, while fishing from the “Pappoose’s Pond,” I discovered one in the very top of a lofty Norway pine—a huge bunch of sticks and long grass, upon the edge of which one of the old herons was standing on one foot, perfectly motionless, with its neck drawn down, and seemingly asleep.
The artist who could have properly sketched that nest and bird would have made his fortune then and there.
C. A. Stephens.