172 THE ODYSSEY OF AN ANIMAL COLLECTOR 
pings passed through into a metal tray, leaving the birds per- 
fectly dry, and with this type of cage straw was unnecessary. By 
carrying out this idea we successfully kept numbers of such deli- 
cate birds as Pygmy Geese and Hottentot Teal without loss. To 
feed the former, I took a two-hundred-pound sack of Indian millet 
with me to Madagascar as they relish small seeds of this type, 
which are unobtainable locally. They will not thrive on paddy. 
The Pygmy Goose, or perhaps African Cotton Teal is a better 
name as it 1s not really a goose, is smaller than our English teal 
and is one of the prettiest of all waterfowl. Even the Antsihanaka 
tribe recognize this, judging by their name for it—vorontsara, i.e., 
handsome bird. It has the upper side glossy green; forehead, face- 
patches and under side, white; crown glossy greenish-black; and 
flanks chestnut. 
When a consignment like this is landed after a long voyage, 
great care has to be exercised in introducing the birds to water. 
One might think on a fine day how nice it would be to let them 
all out on one’s private lake or pond for exercise. This would be 
disastrous, for the birds would swim out, become water-logged 
and drown. They must be kept in sunny places with shallow pans 
to get into, and when thoroughly wet the water taken away so 
that they quickly dry again in the sun. More and more time can 
gradually be given for bathing until the natural oiliness comes 
back to the feathers. 
Staying at the mission proved of immense value to me, for it 
meant that I was able to leave Delys in safety to look after the 
collection while I went off for a few days to the forest some twelve 
miles to the east. The evergreen forest belt runs north and south 
for the greater part of the length of Madagascar and varies from 
ten to twenty miles wide. It is mostly on the first range of hills 
inland from the sea and catches all the rain-bearing clouds brought 
in by the southeast trade winds. Rainfall is plentiful and rivers 
and streams are everywhere. By contrast, on the west side of 
Madagascar the rainfall is spasmodic and there is a long dry sea- 
son, and under these climatic conditions an entirely different 
vegetation with mostly deciduous trees has evolved. 
It is the forests that harbor most of the lemurs, and in the par- 
ticular section that I visited I found Ruffed Lemurs very plentiful, 
