304 SAVAGE SUDAN 



in lavender and chestnut (Emberiza ccesia], indigo finches 

 {Hypoch&ra ultramarina\ waxbills (Estrilda], fire-finches 

 (Lagonosticta) all -these three, feathered gems together 

 with innumerable warblers. These latter, however, in 

 winter are silent. The only local songster at this season 

 is the bulbul (Pycnonotus arsinoe], whose triple flute-like 

 trill never wearies the ear, despite ceaseless iteration. 

 Many of our familiar European warblers make their 

 winter -quarters here; but all maintain, not only the 

 strictest silence, but many an unwonted seclusion. Thus, 

 for example, the conspicuous rufous warbler (Aedon 

 g~alactodes) that in Spanish springtide almost "leaps to 

 the eye," here skulks so persistently that but for some 

 fugitive glimpse, or the flirt of its boldly barred tail, one 

 might never suspect its presence. 1 



Not all creatures, however, appreciate the amenities 

 of civilisation there are those to which such conditions 

 are anathema ; and the little sunbirds furnish an example 

 thereof. When, after the reconquest, Khartoum lay in 

 ruins when the hateful Sodom-apple ( Calotropis pro cerd) 

 flourished where streets had stood the particular sun- 

 bird that then adorned a desolation was not the pretty 

 "Pulchella" just described, but an allied form, even 

 smaller, the metallic sunbird (Nectarinia metallicd}. 

 But, so soon as reconstruction commenced, and more 

 civilised shrubs such as Erythrina, oleander, sessaban, 

 etc. had displaced that emblem of stark desolation, the 

 Sodom-apple, the change at once drove out that tiny 

 barbaric beauty " Metallica," and its vacated place was 

 re-occupied by its sybarite cousin, "Pulchella" aforesaid. 



1 Following is a list of our British summer warblers observed wintering 

 at Khartoum : Chiffchaff and willow-wren ; also icterine warbler (Hypolais 

 pallida), blackcap (and also orphean) warblers ; lesser whitethroats in 

 swarms, redstart, whinchat, and wheatear ; swallow, sand-martin, and 

 swift. Sedge- and reed-warblers have also been recorded, and the garden- 

 warbler more rarely. Red-throated pipits (Anthus cervinus) abound, with 

 tree-pipits in lesser evidence. Some of the above, of course, are not 

 strictly warblers. None will accuse the swift of that quality. 



