64 THE REDISCOVERED COUNTRY 



may or may not be true of the species in general. But 

 I personally know of some hundreds of thousands that 

 do their feeding daytimes! 



In identically the same way a pure white cloud hang- 

 ing in the sky proved to be snow geese. Another was 

 of white peHcans. 



By and by we came to a papyrus marsh in the water 

 along the edge of which were countless hordes of geese, 

 ducks, waders, and many sorts of ibis, plover, egrets, 

 etc. Never have I seen so many and so varied water- 

 fowl. They were quite tame and did not take wing 

 until we were less than forty yards away. Over them 

 wheeled a cloud of insect-catching birds. And still 

 higher soared grandly the hawks and eagles and carrion 

 eaters. 



A great deal of game comes here for salt — ^wildebeeste, 

 ostrich, zebra, and many giraffe. We saw considerable; 

 but were especially impressed by the abundance of 

 spoor. 



We wanted to get over to an island around which the 

 N'gouramani divided, and we slopped about for an 

 hour trying to find a ford. The river had here over- 

 flowed for a quarter of a mile, and the channel was 

 discoverable only when one fell into it. Finally we 

 made passage a little over waist deep and camped on 

 our island. This was a barren piece of land about 

 four miles long by a half mile wide. No shelter. Put 

 our blankets over the tents for additional shade. 



