X36 TRAVELS IN UPPER 



are replaced by the bengalis*, the senegalis -}•, 

 and the lut!e sparrows of the Senegal :£. Not 

 being able, after what I have just now said, to 

 ascribe the cause of this fact to the excessive heat, 

 I think I can account for it from the difference of 

 the alimentary plants used in those parts of Africa. 

 Wheat and its kindred grains are cultivated in 

 Egypt, in Nubia, in Abyssinia, just as on the Bar- 

 bary coast ; they cease to be so toward the vicinity 

 of cape Blanc ; other nutritive plants supply their 

 place to the negroes which inhabit to the south of 

 that promontory ; and the grains of those plants 

 are no longer a food suitable to sparrows ; so that 

 if they do not frequent all the corn-bearing coun- 

 tries, it is at least certain that they never fix a re- 

 sidence in those where that species of grain and 

 its kindred plants are not cultivated. 



The rapid glance which we have just taken of 

 some of the productions of animated nature, re- 

 freshed the imagination, fatigued with hovering 

 over fragments and rubbish. Thanks be to the 

 mother of all beings! Eternal praises be ascribed 



* The bengaii, Buffon, Hist. Nat. des Ois. & pi. enlum. 

 No. 115, fig. 1. Fringilla bengalus. Lin. 



f The senegali, Buffon, H.st. Nat des Ois. & pi. enlum. 

 No. 157, fig. 1. and the stript-d senega i, ibid. & pi. enlum. No. 

 157> fi&" 2 - Fringilla senega! a. Lin. 



% Buffon, Hist. Nat. des Oi?. & pi. enlum. No. 280, fig. %. 



to 



