WILD LIFE ACROSS THE WORLD 



by watching a hen secretary-bird doing a kind of dance 

 near her nest. She would take a series of long hops, 

 at the same time slowly fanning her wings and 

 occasionally turn right round. She kept this up for 

 some time, till at last with one tremendous jump in 

 the air, she landed right on to her nest and proceeded 

 to settle down. 



I have read Rider Haggard's King Solomon's Mines, 

 and considered it a capital yarn, but always thought 

 that some of the more impossible incidents should 

 be taken with a grain of salt, especially that wherein 

 Captain Good petrifies the Kykanas by taking out 

 his false teeth. 



Now I myself happen to have some false teeth, 

 and one particular evening I went across to the fire 

 to obtain a mug of warm water for the very necessary 

 and laudable purpose of cleansing them. It was 

 merely chance, of course, that instead of retiring to 

 the privacy of my tent I put my hand up to my 

 mouth and extracted the teeth in sight of the natives. 

 The effect on the porters who observed this was 

 instantaneous and astonishing. In spite of the dark- 

 ness one bolted into the bush, another who was 

 squatting lost his balance and rolled over backwards, 

 doing a complete somersault, two more lay flat on 

 the ground, whilst the rest stepped back several 

 paces shouting and chattering thirteen to the dozen. 

 However, after a few minutes we managed to reassure 



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