594 Dr. R. B. Sharpe on Birds 



the ground has been trodden hard the grass comes up. While 

 these patches of old garden-ground form but a small propor- 

 tion of the entire surface of the country, they are important 

 as having a fauna almost distinct from that of the forest. 

 Many forest-birds and animals are never met with in such 

 places, while many species are confined to them and are never 

 found in the forest. One would no more expect to see a 

 Weaver-bird (Hyphantornis) or to hear the cackling of the 

 ' Okwal ' (Francolinus squamatus) in the dense forest than 

 in some other country and climate. The old garden-land 

 seems to have a greater variety and abundance of small birds 

 than the forest." 



" One hundred and fifty or two hundred miles from the 

 coast the sort of open growth found in the old gardens is much 

 more extensive, either because a different soil or a scantier 

 rainfall causes ground once cleared of forest to remain so, 

 or because there has been in former years a great population 

 which no longer exists. At that distance towards the interior 

 there are also extensive grassy places. The numerous birds 

 peculiar to the old garden-ground, where it exists in the small 

 patches above described nearer the coast, must have come 

 from the extensive open country farther inland.'"' 



" North and south through the Bulu country, parallel with 

 the coast, runs what is sometimes spoken of as a range of 

 mountains. It is not really such, however, but only the 

 broken and hilly district forming the edge of the great 

 plateau of Central Africa. In journeying to the interior from 

 the coast there is a continual ascent in the hilly region ; but 

 when the hills are past, instead of a corresponding descent, 

 there is still a slight increase of elevation as the traveller goes 

 eastward. Efulen, fifty miles from the coast, is in the midst 

 of the most rugged hills. Ebolewo'o, a hundred and ten miles 

 from the coast, is in a less hilly country, but the elevation is 

 greater. A few days' journey east of Ebolewo'o there are no 

 hills at all ; but the traveller continues to ascend, as is 

 proved by the course of the streams, till he insensibly crosses 

 from the river-basin of the coast to that of the Congo 

 and finds the streams fiowin<r toward the interior. This 



