Although in a particular place, apparently favourable, some dozens of these birds may be found to-day, yet, perhaps, on visiting it to-morrow, you will not find one remaining; and districts resorted to one season or year, will be found deserted by them the next. That they migrate by night I have always felt assured, but that they are altogether nocturnal is rather uncertain, for in more than half a dozen instances I have surprised them in the act of procuring food in the middle of the day when the sun was shining brightly. That they are extremely timid I well know, for on several occasions, when I have suddenly come upon them, they have stood still from mere terror, until I have knocked them down with an oar or stick. Yet, when wounded, and their courage is raised, they shew great willingness to defend themselves, and if in the presence of a dog, they never fail to spread out to their full extent the feathers of the neck, leaving its hind part bare, ruffle those of their body, extend their wings, and strike violently at their enemy. When seized they scratch furiously, and endeavour to bite, so that, unless great care be taken, they may inflict severe wounds. I never saw one of them fly farther than thirty or forty yards at a time; and on such occasions, their movements were so sluggish as to give opportunities of easily shooting them; for they generally rise within a few yards of you, and fly off very slowly in a direct course. Their cries at such times greatly resemble those of the Night and Yellow-crowned Herons. My friends, Dr BACHMAN and Mr NUTTALL, have both heard the love-notes of this bird. The former says, in a letter to me, “their hoarse croakings, as if their throats were filled with water, were heard on every side;” and the latter states that “instead of the _búmp_ or _böomp_ of the true Bittern, their call is something like the uncouth syllables of _’pump-aū-gàh_, but uttered in the same low, bellowing tone.” Dr BACHMAN procured, on the 29th April 1833, about forty miles from Charleston, individuals, in the ovaries of which he found eggs so large as to induce him to believe that they would have been laid in the course of a single week. Some others which were procured by him and myself within nine miles of Charleston, on the 29th of March, had the eggs extremely small. While at Passamaquody Bay, at the eastern extremity of the United States, I was assured that this species bred in the vicinity; but I saw none there, or in any of the numerous places examined on my way to Labrador and Newfoundland. In neither of these countries did I meet with a single person who was acquainted with it. In few other species of maritime or marsh birds have I seen so much difference of size and weight, even in the same sex. Of about twenty specimens in my possession, scarcely two correspond in the length of the bills, legs, or wings. The plate before you was engraved from a drawing made by my son JOHN WOODHOUSE.