THE BIVOUAC. 357 



where the scenery is striking for its desolation, though 

 enlivened somewhat by the cries of the Seagull, the 

 Long-tailed Hareld, the Eider, and others of the 

 feathered trihe. Indeed, if the weather be genial, what 

 with fishing, fowling, collecting eggs and specimens of 

 rare birds, and a bathe now and then, a man can hardly 

 spend a summer day more agreeably than amongst the 

 islands. On these occasions we seldom troubled ourselves 

 to look out for night quarters, but at dusk made for the 

 nearest islet, and with a stone for a pillow, and the sky 

 for our canopy, slept, as depicted above, on the naked 

 rock. Usually we were provided with a coverlid of some 

 kind or other ; and as we generally had coffee and a 

 sufficiency of eatables with us, the night was commonly 

 passed in tolerable comfort. 



My most constant companion on these occasions was 

 Charles John Anderson, the now celebrated African 

 traveller, then a youth in his teens, and who even at that 

 early age showed the determined spirit of enterprise and 

 accurate observation of nature in all her varieties, which 

 have been since so fully displayed in his daring career as 

 a geographical discoverer and naturalist. His deeds, so 

 well known through his works, " Lake N'gami " and the 



o ? o 



" Okovango River," have established his fame; and I am 

 happy to say that he is about adding to his reputation by 

 the publication of a beautifully illuminated work on the 

 Avi-Fauna of South- Western Africa, which Messrs. Day & 

 Son are to bring out in their best style. 



Once, however, when we were bivouacking in the 

 " Skiirgard," a mishap had well nigh befallen us, or rather 

 our boat. The shades of evening having set in, we, as 

 usual, landed on the lee side of a small island, and after 

 securely mooring, as we imagined, our little craft, and 

 partaking of an ample supper the gun and the fishing- 

 rod having added to our scanty stores we crept under the 



