STRANGE BIRDS 141 



to swim. These pelicans are the same kind that 

 are found along the California coast. 



Long-tailed grackles flew about in flocks or 

 singly, much as our blackbirds do in the United 

 States. They seemed to thrive on city life and 

 they were as impertinent as English sparrows. 

 I remember one sleek black fellow that sauntered 

 up and down the platform of the Balboa station 

 as if he were himself a passenger for the early 

 morning train, and squawked grackle talk to the 

 small crowd waiting there. From the train 

 windows we saw them along the cleared and 

 fenced pasture lands. They ranged themselves 

 on bushes and sat there to watch the train go 

 by, looking like shiny ornaments on some new 

 kind of Christmas tree. 



We kept a lookout from the train over the 

 lily pads that grow in the quiet bays of Gatun 

 Lake (Fig. 61), and usually we were rewarded by 

 a sight of jacanas. Jacanas are long- toed water 

 birds which run daintily around over the lily 

 pads, scarcely wetting their feet at all. The bird 

 itself is heavier than a robin, but its long legs end 

 in slender-toed feet with a vSpread of six inches. 

 The lily pads are small, but the wide feet spread 

 the jacana's weight as a snowshoe does a man's 

 on soft snow. 



The jacanas were more interesting than the 

 hawks flying over the Canal or back up in the 

 valleys. The hawks looked much like our own 



