Franz was my companion, carrying a small gun, entrusted to him for the first time.
We took Fan and Bruno with us, and went slowly along the left bank of the lake, winding our way among reedy thickets, which frequently turned us aside a considerable distance from the water. The dogs hunted about in all directions, and raised duck, snipe, and heron. These usually flew directly across the lake, so that Franz got no chance of a shot. He began to get rather impatient, and proposed firing at the black swans we saw sailing gracefully on the glassy surface of the lake.
Just then a harsh booming sound struck our ears. I paused in wonder as to whence the noise proceeded, while Franz exclaimed, “Oh, father! can that be Swift, our young onager?”
“It cannot possibly be Swift,” said I; adding, after listening attentively a minute or two, “I am inclined to think it must be the cry of a bittern, a fine handsome bird of the nature of a heron.”
“Oh! may I shoot it, father? But I wonder how a bird can make that roaring noise! One would think it was an ox, it is more like lowing than braying.”
“The noise creatures make depends more on the construction of the windpipe, its relation to the lungs and the strength of the muscles which force out the breath, than on their size. As for example, how loud is the song of the nightingale and the little canary bird. Some people say that the bittern booms with his long bill partly thrust into the boggy ground, which increases the hollow muffled sound of its very peculiar cry.”
Franz was very anxious that the first trophy of his gun should be so rare a bird as the bittern; the dogs were sent into the wood, and we waited some distance apart, in readiness to fire.
All at once there was a great rustling in the thicket. Franz fired, and I heard his happy voice calling out:
“I've hit him! I've hit him!”
