138 Zoological Society : — 



the shallowness of the water distributed over a large surface affords 

 it greater facilities for wading than the banks of the Nile. These 

 frequently shelve off into deep water more or less abruptly, and thus 

 furnish but comparatively few spots favourable to the support and 

 habits of the bird. 



For this reason, at about 100 miles west of the Nile, in from 5° to 

 8° N. lat., at Gaba Shambyl, where I have a station of elephant- 

 hunters, these interesting birds exist in greater numbers than on the 

 Nile, or the comparatively deeper waters of the Bahr il Gazal, the 

 lake to which I have alluded, and of which I have the honour of being, 

 if not, strictly speaking, the discoverer, at least the first navigator. 



At Gaba Shambyl, striking off directly west from the Nile, the 

 country for the first 30 miles rises with an almost imperceptible slope, 

 when it again decreases in elevation for a distance of 60 to 70 miles. 

 Here it becomes a large morass (with, occasionally, dry spots, which 

 form so many islands in a sheet of water after the annual rains) that 

 from north to south extends probably over 150 miles, having no outlet 

 directly to the Nile, but, when the water is at a certain height, 

 overflowing into a channel connecting it with the Bahr il Gazal. 

 This reservoir, which is more or less supplied with water all the 

 year round, abounds in reeds and thick bush, and is the favourite re- 

 treat and home of the Balceniceps. 



The birds here are seen in clusters of from a pair to perhaps one 

 hundred together, mostly in the water, and when disturbed will fly 

 low over its surface, and settle at no great distance ; but if frightened 

 and fired at, they rise in flocks high in the air, and, after hovering 

 and wheeling around, will settle on the highest trees, and as long as 

 their disturbers are near will not return to the water. Their roosting- 

 place at night is, to the best of my belief, on the ground. Their 

 food is principally fish and water-snakes, which they have been seen 

 by my men to catch and devour. They will also feed on the intes- 

 tines of dead animals, the carcasses of which they easily rip open 

 with the strong hook of the upper bill. The breeding-time of the 

 Balceniceps is in the rainy season, during the months of July and 

 August ; and the spot chosen is in the reeds or high grass imme- 

 diately on the water's edge, or on some small elevated and dry spots 

 entirely surrounded by water. The birds, before laying, scrape a hole 

 in the earth, in which, without any lining of grass or feathers, the 

 female deposits her eggs. As many as a dozen eggs have been found 

 in the same nest. Numbers of these nests have been robbed by my 

 men of both eggs and young ; but the young birds so taken have in- 

 variably died. After repeated unsuccessful attempts to rear them, 

 and more trouble than you can imagine, after two years' perseverance 

 I at last succeeded in hatching some eggs under hens, which, at a con- 

 siderable distance from Gaba Shambyl, I procured from the Raik ne- 

 groes. As soon as I got the hens to lay, and in due time to sit, by 

 replacing several of their eggs with half the number of those of the 

 Balceniceps, as fresh as possible from the nest, the locality of which 

 was previously known, I eventually succeeded in hatching several 

 birds. These ran about the premises of my camp, and, to the 



