The Sedalia weekly bazoo. [volume] (Sedalia, Mo.) 187?-1904, 1889-07-09
TOM AND PEGGY.
Two Panied Herons of Enormous Ape
tites and Proportionate Pluck.

Two Panied Herons of Enormous Ape
tites and Proportionate Pluck.
Much food is required to forward
the rapid growth of the young herons:
a portion, either through clumsincss
or safety. being allowed TO fall to the
ground, where it soon develops an Odoi
very characteristic of heronries in gen.
eral.
once secured, after a prolonged
and far from scathless scramble among
the thorhy branches of wild plum
thicket. pair of these unpromisins
infants, rs yet in their callow immatu-
rity. AT first they seemed intractable,
but sufficiency of good food and i'm.
munity from further injury soon gained
their confidence, and they grew, in
course of time, excessively tame, even
invading the sacred precincts of the
farmhouse kitchen. Their appetites
were enormous, and appeared to in
crease with time, so that it became a
formidable matter to supply the nee
essary provender. Snakes, fish, grubs,
grasshoppers, and odd scraps of un.
cooked meat disappeared, with perfect
impartiality, into their voracious
maws. A heron's throat is very dill.
table, and they can swallow substances
that appear enormous in comparison
with that organ. When one under.
takes the injection of "a large, tlai
fish, the neck, expanding to accommo-
date its form, presents most curious
appearance. Should the object be
very long, as snake or eel, the heron
coolly puts it down as far as it viii
go, and complacently waits, with out
stretched neck, until the part first
swallowed digests away, when another
section is engulfed. The action of the
gastric juice in the stomachs of fish,
eating birds is so rapid that it takes
them but trifing time to dispose of
large mass of food.
Ny herons, Tom" and Peggy
were plucky in the extreme, and,
though peaceable enough when not
imposed upon, resented fiercely any
domineering from the barnyard in
habitants. Their combined forces
were always more than sufficient to
rout the enemy. Once only we wit
messed an instance of their partial dis
comfiture. Tom had accepted the
challenge of bullying young rooster,
and at the first pass was placed hors
du combat, with spur through his
throat. Before the cock had time to
sound his clarion of victory, Peggy"
with a savage cry, came dartine
through the air, and although full on
his back, by fierce stroke of her
spear-like bill, deprived him of an eye.
So vigorously did she follow up her
advantage, that most energetic inter
ference was required to save the fowl
from complete destruction.
Toms" wound was so severe that o
considerable portion of his internal
anatomy was exposed; nevertheless ne
recovered rapidly. A contraction of the
gullet followed, which afterward oftep
caused him great establishment by re-
fusing TO pass such large articles a;
formerly. Occasionally he would at
tempt to swallow a dried sunAsh OF
other spiny object, which. sticking
fast, could be neither cast up nor
down. A little water, with some
careful manipulations, always relieved
him from his unpleasant predicament;
but 10 the last experience did not
render him wiser on this point. Their
exceeding tameness exposed them to
great danger when they chansed to
wander from their adopted home, and
their fate at last was that OF being
stoued to death. american Ml1aztns.