86 TRAVELS IN UPPER 



somewhat whimsical imagination of M. Tott fre- 

 quently teemed : it was subjecting the navigation 

 of the frigate to a very unpleasant embarrassment, 

 the felucca not being able to sail at the same rate, 

 and totally unfit for encountering a gale of wind. 

 The captain soon tired of such a convoy, and I 

 have been informed that soon after he left Alex- 

 andria he staved and sunk her. 



On the morning of the 8th, the weather being 

 extremely fine, and a light breeze from the north- 

 west, a bird of prey, which appeared to me to be a 

 male sparrow-hawk *, came and perched on the 

 yards of the frigate; we were from fourteen to fif- 

 teen leagues from all land. The sailors called him 

 a corsair, because he cruises to catch on their pas T 

 sage quails, and other migrant birds which cross 

 and re- cross those seas, a transit exposed to mani- 

 fold dangers. Sometimes precipitated into the bil- 

 lows by the impetuosity of the blast 5 sometimes 

 torn in pieces by the cruel pounces of cruisers 

 winged like themselves, those interesting and de- 

 fenceless creatures, on arriving upon the shores 

 which promised them repose, after so many dangers 

 and fatigues, rarely escape the death prepared for 

 them by man, the most voracious and the most 

 pitiless of all their enemies. 



* Epervier, Hist. Nat. des, Ois — Fakonisus. Lin. 



Our 



