THE CORMORANT 193 



as true of bird life as any other. Elsewhere I 

 have referred to the beauty and charm of Lake 

 Menzaleh to all naturalists, and I do really think 

 that to get anything like a complete view of 

 Egyptian bird life a visit ought to be paid to some 

 one or other of the lakes, and of course Menzaleh 

 is far and away the best and biggest. But though I 

 suggest a visit, I would not care to have it under- 

 stood I recommend it as a health resort or place to 

 live in. I write this here, because there are two 

 considerable Cormorant rookeries or breeding- 

 stations that I visited on Lake Menzaleh — there 

 may be others I did not find, but these two I did 

 find, and they will ever live in my memory as the 

 most poisonous plots of earth I have ever stood on. 

 I have been to Cormorant rookeries before, and well 

 know that they don't smell like rose-gardens. The 

 peculiarity of this great lake is, that it is, and 

 always has been, a great drainage-bed for the whole 

 of Egypt. The result of having been a drainage- 

 bed for all these untold years is that when you 

 stick a pole, or your oar, into the mud and then 

 pull it out, you seem to all at once take the 

 cork out of a bottle containing the most appal- 

 ling stinks and gases that ever were engendered. 

 One day I was stalking Cormorants on a long flat 



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