Introduction -> 



they can tell one many a true detail, they will mix up 

 the true and the false, the mythical and the fabulous, 

 as readily as did our forefathers in these British Islands, 

 who could repeat in one natural-history book after another 

 the ridiculous story that barnacle-geese were produced 

 by bivalve molluscs, or that swallows hibernated at 

 the bottoms ot ponds, or that toads were found alive 

 after being embedded in the rocks for countless centuries. 

 The natural historian of to-day must be an educated 

 man, not jumping too rashly at conclusions, and not 

 even trusting his own eyes and ears too implicitly, but 

 checking his information over and over again before he 

 gives it to the world. 



The writer of this Introduction has travelled more widelv 



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and extensively in Africa even in East Africa than 

 Herr Schillings ; but his time and attention have often 

 been occupied by many other matters than natural history. 

 In his observations, therefore, on the life-habits of these 

 East African birds and beasts he willingly retires into* 

 the background, and would in almost all cases subscribe 

 without cavil to the correctness and value of Schillings'' 

 descriptions. He has, however, here and there ventured 

 to correct his spelling of East African words, where this,, 

 through oversight or mishearing) has been incorrectlv 



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rendered. Herr Schillings has not been able to excel in 

 every branch of African research, and has evidently not 

 studied to any extent the structure of the Masai language 

 (a Nilotic Xegro tongue), or he would attach no im- 

 portance to the theory of Captain Merker that the Masai 

 are a branch of the Hebrew race. The writer of this 



