612 Colonel S. R. Clarke on [Ibis, 



Black Finch-Lurk (^Pyrrhulaiula austrulin). I hud met with 

 each o£ these two last-named species on only one occasion, 

 when collecting carefully during eight months in the 

 Bloemfontein district. After this short expedition we 

 again took the train for Rhodesia ; soon after leaving 

 Mafeking the railway-line enters very loose bush-veld, and 

 though I believe we passed through one or two patches of 

 open country in the night before reaching Monze, it was, as 

 far as we saw, bush-veld, more or less dense, over practically 

 the whole of the 700 miles of the eastern fringe of the 

 Kalahari and the parts of western Rhodesia traversed in our 

 railway journey to Monze, which is situated in long. 27° E., 

 hit. 16° 50' S. 



We reached our destination on the 2iid of August about 

 10 in the morning, the frost of the night had disappeared, 

 and we found our tents and two wagons waiting ready 

 for us. We trekked at once and crossed a rolling open 

 country with grazing grass, now dry from the winter's 

 sunshine and drought, to the first water some seven miles 

 west. Livingstone^s Chat [Saxicola pileata livingstonn) and 

 a Drongo {Dicrurus adsiinilis) were seen on the plain, 

 and near the water Doves and iSwainson's Francolin {Pternistes 

 swainsoni). The next morning we [tushed on, the rolling 

 grass-veld was left behind, and we entered a country of bush 

 more or less dense interspersed with glades of open country, 

 which, except on the flats by the Kafue River, were never 

 of great extent. This country is, without being absolutely 

 flat, very level, and dongas and streams few and far between. 

 I was informed that the summer rainfall is very heavy, as 

 much as oO inches of rain i'alling in January and February ; 

 and, there being little surface drainage to carry off the water, 

 the country during the summer months is waterlogged, and 

 this probably accounts for the scarcity of Larks. Of these 

 we only identified one species {Te/Jirocorys saturatiui'); of 

 Pij)its one {Anthus sordidvs nyassce) ; also one Macronyx, the 

 beautiful M. wintoni, which so far as we observed was 

 confined to the flats by the Kafue River. Bustards uere also 

 scarce, and we only killed Otis niela^iogastev ; of Francolins, 



