SAND-GROUSE 29 



muscular development, enable them to cover daily 

 a very large expanse of country at an immense rate 

 of speed. In the day-time they are scattered far 

 and wide in pairs ; at night and morning they resort 

 simultaneously with the exactitude of clockwork to 

 their distant watering-places, where they drink in 

 bands of enormous numbers. Far though they 

 wander in search of food, the exact timing of their 

 drinking hour never fails; if each bird carried a 

 twenty-guinea watch its punctuality could not be 

 greater. As you travel by some stream of the wil- 

 derness towards sunset, or stand with outspanned 

 wagons at morning between eight and ten, you 

 may watch the swift and arrow-like flight of these 

 desert birds as they speed from all quarters of the 

 compass. Arrived at the water, they collect in dense 

 flocks, circle round and round, swoop down, take 

 their drink at the margin, and then again disperse. 

 The sand-grouse is a welcome bird to the traveller. 

 Many a time in penetrating parched and waterless 

 country have the weary footsteps of the hunter and 

 explorer been directed to water by the flight of 

 these birds. Many a catastrophe to beast and man 

 has been averted by these unerring guides. At such 

 a time the sight of these swift creatures speeding 

 over the hot waste, their forms showing dark ao^ainst 

 the red and orange sky of sunset, is worth more than 

 a wagon-load of gold. 



