THE WHITE PELICAN 187 



thousands, passing low along the river on their way 

 north, and although fired at several times they still 

 kept streaming onwards in one continuous flock." 

 Nowadays you will quite possibly see immense 

 flocks going south in November, or north in the 

 spring, but they will all be flying high and well out 

 of gun-shot. The largest flock I ever saw was in 

 December of 1907 when living at Deir-el-Bahari. 

 I was working outside the hut there, when some 

 noise made me look up, and I saw an amazing sight, 

 hundreds and hundreds of these great birds flying 

 round and round in circles high above the chalk 

 cliff. This was about 2 p.m., and they remained 

 thus slowly circling round and round till nearly 

 5 p.m., when gradually in small detachments they 

 dwindled away, flying in a southerly direction. At 

 times they came sufficiently low for me to see dis- 

 tinctly the yellow pouch hanging from the under- 

 bill, but then again they would rise in great spiral 

 curves to such a height that even with my pet glass 

 they were almost invisible. With every new curve 

 they showed some alteration of colour, so that some- 

 times they seemed a coral pink all over, and then 

 again with some altered angle in relation to the sun 

 they were a pure snow white. The two hours or 

 more that they were over just this one spot where 



