Perhaps bitterns may also formerly have frequented some of the countries belonging to it, though they are not mentioned among the birds of the region by modern writers.
There is a bird of the heron species, or rather of a species between the heron and the stork, which seems to deserve a few words of special description.

It is found chiefly in Northern Syria, in the plain of Aleppo and the districts watered by the Koweik and Sajur rivers.

The Arabs call it Tair-el-Raouf, or "the magnificent." This bird is of a grayish-white, the breast white, the joints of the wings tipped with scarlet, and the under part of the beak scarlet, the upper part being of a blackish-gray.

The beak is nearly five inches long, and two thirds of an inch thick.

The circumference of the eye is red; the feet are of a deep yellow; and the bird in its general form strongly resembles the stork; but its color is darker.