THE PELICAN OF THE WILDERNESS 3 



feeding-time, a very different bird engaged our 

 attention. 



It was sunset as we struck the river, and day was 

 sinking far away across the flat and endless plains 

 in ruddy splendour. On our right, a vast mass of 

 flaming reeds (now being burnt off by the natives) 

 sent an immense column of smoke far into the 

 heavens. High in the air above the river, their 

 flight clearly marked in long, wavy skeins against 

 the rose and amber sky, flew slowly and steadily 

 hundreds upon hundreds of great birds, which Joseph, 

 the native boy riding with us, informed us were 

 pelicans. It was a marvellous and most beautiful 

 sight. Each bird followed its neighbour in single 

 file in the most regular order ; the great wings (and 

 no one can imagine how great is the spread of a 

 pelican's wings till they have been extended and 

 measured in the dead specimen) beating the passage 

 through the air in solemn and stately fashion. There 

 were numerous different bands in the air, each 

 numbering some hundreds, and as the long skeins and 

 circles occasionally crossed or united in mid-air, all 

 sharply silhouetted against the evening sky, the 

 effect was indescribably beautiful. Presently, before 

 we had actually reached the river, the skeins trended 

 lower and lower, and the birds sank, still in orderly 

 and majestic flight, into the shallows and reed-beds 

 for their night's repast and repose. 



