,The Wit of the Wild 



r 



they warn these animals in the same way. The 

 buffaloes of Central Africa are also guarded and 

 attended in a similar manner by a beautiful lit- 

 tle white egret, whose snowy plumage and statu- 

 esque pose look very quaint perched upon some 

 shaggy old bull of the forest. Zebras are looked 

 after by a helmet-shrike, and " the tiny three- 

 collared plover," according to Bryden, " is 

 called the * sea-cow bird ' from its fondness for 

 the hippopotamus, or sea-cow, with which it is 

 often found associating." Hunters are well 

 aware of these facts, for they have lost many 

 an expected trophy or sorely needed dinner on 

 account of them, and you cannot persuade them 

 that the association is anything less than a real 

 and intelligent partnership. 



The most extraordinary of these mutually 

 protective arrangements, however, is that be- 

 tween Cook's petrel and the tuatara lizard of 

 New Zealand. This petrel, or " titi," breeds on 

 rocky islets on the New Zealand coast and de- 

 posits a single egg at the interior end of a tor- 

 tuous burrow several feet long, dug by the birds 

 themselves. 



