64 ON SAFARI 



Both the woods of Njemps and the marshes of the 

 Molo that adjoined them swarmed with strange birds 

 and unknown w^ater-fowh Gladly would I have spent 

 more time in investigating these, but the major quest 

 forbade. There were squawking bronze -green parrots — 

 I took these to be parrots — an elusive cuckoo with ruddy 

 breast that betrayed his genus by a muffled note, but 

 avoided all save a fugitive glance. There were wood- 

 peckers great and small — some no bigger than creepers ; 



EAEBET. 



Colours gold, lemon and crimson, black and white, 



barbets — thick-set, " dumpy " birds, in coloration akin to 

 the last, thouo;h so different in habit : bush-shrikes and 

 babblers; tiny warbler-like "white-eyes" {Zosterops), 

 cousins of the sun-biids ; colies in little jDarties, and 

 glossy starlings {Lamprocolius), the latter nesting in 

 hollow trees as starlings do at home. In the marshes 

 we noticed various herons and egrets, spur-wing plovers, 

 common and other sandpipers, kingfishers azure and 

 pied, rails and chestnut-red jacanas. 



Next morning our scouts were away before dawn, 

 but I was glad to be told that an early start was not 

 necessary, since, having tramped over thirty miles the 

 previous day, I wanted an " easy." At ten o'clock a 

 little wizened savage (the same who had brought the 

 first news to Baringo) came in and reported he had 

 actually seen the elephant at dawn, that he was an 



