VOYAGE UP WHITE NILE 



63 



but on my approach he rose from a newly-killed hare, its 

 head torn off and body partly eaten quick work in less 

 than five minutes? The eagle was Aquila rapax. 

 Presently Abdul knocked on the head a crouching 

 guinea-fowl close by, and the whole pack, we then found, 

 lay terror-stricken in the deep grass. A curious incident 

 occurred with another eagle. Willoughby Lowe had 

 shot one of the little black sparrow-hawks (Melierax 

 gabar) when a white-headed eagle swept down from 

 behind, clutched the dead hawk and carried it off in 

 triumph ! On one occasion, Butler saw a pair of tawny 

 eagles attack a big cane-rat (Thryonomys, a rare beast) 

 not 100 yards away. Within brief seconds B. was at the 

 spot, but the rat was already so mutilated as to be beyond 

 patching up as a specimen. 



EGRETS AND HERON White Nile. 



