5140 THE ZooLoGist—NoveEMBER, 1876. 
and which no man who has seen it will ever forget. When the naturalist 
has got over his ecstacies he had better go to the mud where they were 
standing, as if, as is most probable, they have been preening themselves, 
he will be rewarded by some exquisite feathers.” 
Almost an equally interesting sight, to a naturalist beholding it 
for the first time, is the vast army of storks upon their migration. 
These birds pass through Egypt about the end of March. Only 
a few remain to nest there. The greater number press on further 
north. Mr. Gurney writes :— 
“TI daresay I shall not be believed when I describe the prodigious 
migratory flights which passed us. Armies of them would whiten the 
sandbanks at early morning, which had evidently spent the night there; 
and by day they were to be seen sailing round and round in countless 
myriads. It dazed the eye to look at them. The air seemed scribbled 
with their white forms. Iam within bounds in saying that there seemed 
enough storks to stock every church, and every tower, and every public 
office in the whole of civilized Europe. To those who deem me romancing, 
let me say this—no one should disbelieve a thing because he has not seen it. 
It must be borne in mind that Egypt, or at least the Nile Valley (they are 
synonymous terms), is one of the greatest arteries, so to speak, by which 
feathered migrants seek a northern clime. Like man, they shun to cross 
the Great Sahara, where the sands are trackless, and the elixir of life— 
water—is wanting. Hence their teeming thousands in the Nile Valley. 
For the same number which, in another and a fertile land, would, perhaps, 
be spread over three thousand miles, are here compressed into a space 
which on an average is only three miles broad. And this will go on for 
ever. The channel which has been found so often will be found again; 
and unless their numbers are kept down by disease, each succeeding year 
will probably witness greater and greater droves, for few guns are employed 
against them, and they enjoy a comparative immunity alike from the real 
sportsman, the naturalist, and the pot-hunter.” 
Mr. Gurney found the Egyptian goose nesting on some lofty 
cliffs, the lower ledges of which were tenanted by pigeons; above 
these were the geese; and higher up still were kites, griffon 
vultures, and a pair of ospreys. The appearance of the great 
blackheaded gull (Larus ichthyaelus) seems to have been dis- 
appointing. Mr. Gurney describes it as far from being as imposing 
when on the wing as the greater blackbacked gull; but as being, 
like that species, very shy and wary: it was already in full summer 
plumage by the 23rd of January. 
