392 SAVAGE SUDAN 



while the through-transit of Europe-bound migrants was a 

 daily and striking phenomenon during March and April. One 

 amusing incident may be related. A rather striking little 

 warbler had outmanoeuvred the ornithological acumen of our 

 triumvirate ; it agreed with nothing in our knowledge. On 

 reaching Khartoum, we submitted the puzzling prize (?) to 

 Mr Butler. He let us down gently, merely inquiring : " Is 

 that not a female of the British blackcap ? " That is exactly 

 what it was ; but, none of us three having before seen a blackcap 

 in winter, that familiar little songster gave us a bad throw. 



Sandgrouse here (as elsewhere in Sudan) are wont to pass 

 over high each morning on their way to water. One evening 

 our landlord informed us he had that day shot " eighty pieces 

 of sandgrouse." Such a bag clearly indicated smart shooting, 

 but illusion vanished when he expressed 

 disappointment that his best single shot had 

 only realised eleven pieces, against fourteen 

 on a previous occasion ! 



In these tropical seas exist fish other than 

 predatory monsters and a thousand-fold more 



beautiful. Peer over the rim of any coral- 

 FOOT OF TROPIC-BIRD. fringed creek and what a scene in fairyland 



the crystal depths reveal Nature run riot in a blaze of flashing 

 prismatic radiance. Each pool teems with creatures that 

 glance and gleam in iridescence and as instantly vanish like 

 shattered fragments of a rainbow. No written words serve to 

 convey an idea of such colour-effects one unit alone is plainly 

 clad in vertical black and white stripes, arranged zebra- 

 fashion : the rest defy description. 



FLAMINGO BAY is an inlet sequestered among the coral 

 reefs (which here extend 16 miles out to sea) and lies north 

 of Port Sudan. On east and north the coral is overlaid with 

 sand, forming desert dunes, half-clad with a lowly salt-scrub, 

 and enclosing lateral lagoons in some of which mangrove-bush 

 (like a rhododendron) grows in salt water. Our Arab crew 

 had kept assuring us we should find these inner lagoons alive 

 with birds. The flamingos were there right enough a dozen 

 or two ; and these, with a few Goliath and reef-herons, spoon- 

 bills, and waders proved to be the chief items in a bird-life by 



