Near the major--not keeping him company, but feeding in the same
shallows and along the same oyster-bars--were constantly to be seen two
smaller relatives of his, the little blue heron and the Louisiana. The
former is what is called a dichromatic species; some of the birds are
blue, and others white. On the Hillsborough, it seemed to me that white
specimens predominated; but possibly that was because they were so much
more conspicuous. Sunlight favors the white feather; no other color
shows so quickly or so far. If you are on the beach and catch sight of a
bird far out at sea,--a gull or a tern, a gannet or a loon,--it is
invariably the white parts that are seen first. And so the little white
heron might stand never so closely against the grass or the bushes on
the further shore of the river, and the eye could not miss him. If he
had been a blue one, at that distance, ten to one he would have escaped
me. Besides, I was more on the alert for white ones, because I was
always hoping to find one of them with black legs. In other words, I was
looking for the little white egret, a bird concerning which, thanks to
the murderous work of plume-hunters,--thanks, also, to those good women
who pay for having the work done,--I must confess that I went to Florida
and came home again without certainly seeing it.
The heron with which I found myself especially taken was the Louisiana;
a bird of about the same size as the little blue, but with an air of
daintiness and lightness that is quite its own, and quite indescribable.
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