132 THE ODYSSEY OF AN ANIMAL COLLECTOR 
One of the great joys of this high grassland is to see the Jack- 
son’s Whydahs at breeding time; at odd points one will spot indi- 
vidual males displaying by leaping up from the ground while 
puffing out their feathers, holding their heads erect and dangling 
their legs. They have regular places for this dancing which are 
easily recognized by the neat round patch of short-cropped grass, 
whereas the surrounding grass may be two feet high or more. No 
one can say that these plains are monotonous with these animated 
black objects bobbing up above the level of the tall grass and dis- 
appearing again. A Jackson’s Whydah lived for sixteen years in 
the London Zoo. 
All too soon I reached a stage when my collection of birds was 
as much as I could cope with, and I returned home with a large 
variety of delicate insect-eating birds as well as nectar-feeders, 
fruit-eaters, and seed-eaters, nearly all of which were new to avi- 
culture in England. 
