22 dresser: three weeks on the GUADALQUIVIR. 



extremely fine, the sun so hot that our faces began to peel, but there 

 was always a wind blowing over the marismas which made it cool, 

 except in the direct rays of the sun. This evening, however, it 

 clouded over, and looked like rain, but early in the morning (8th May) 

 the clouds began to disperse, and it soon became very hot. At six 

 o'clock we steamed along two or three miles to a place where the 

 horses were awaiting us, and we then mounted, and started across a 

 flat country, most of which had recently been submerged, but was 

 now covered with a tolerably dense growth of herbage, and studded 

 somewhat closely with low bushes. Here we found a nest of the 

 Mallard {Anas boschas) with fresh eggs, and saw several Marbled 

 Duck {Anas angustirostris), but could find no nest. The Black- 

 bellied Sand-Grouse {Pterocles arenarius) was seen several times ; 

 and in the far distance, wading in a shallow lake, were hundreds 

 of Flamingoes, looking like a white stripe on the horizon. 

 Last season they nested here, but the present season being a 

 dry one, not a nest was to be found. Many of the shallow 

 lakes were dried up, and large tracts which last year were covered 

 with water, were now overgrown with grass, or were a nearly bare 

 tract of sun-dried mud. Here we also met with several Harriers 

 {Circus centginosus and Circus cineraceus), both of which are arrant 

 egg-thieves, and destroy numbers of nests. We camped for lunch 

 on a small island on which Convolvulus minor grew in great 

 abundance; and here, as in most parts of the dry parts of the 

 marshes, the Painted Lady Butterfly ( Vanessa cardui) was extremely 

 numerous. Kentish Plover and Pratincole flew past us as we 

 were eating our lunch, and many flocks of shore birds were 

 wading about in the shallow water. After lunch we went some 

 distance along the lagoon, and then waded across to a dry patch on 

 which the old man, who acted as our guide, told us we should find 

 the Slender-billed Gull {Larus gelastes) breeding, and we certainly 

 found several nests, but they contained only egg-shells, all the eggs 

 having been broken, which was a great disappointment to us. We 

 saw no Gulls, but many GuU-bifled Terns {Sterna anglica), one of 

 which we shot. We saw many Grey-headed Wagtails {Motacilla Jiavd) 

 and Short-toed Larks, and took one nest of Calandrella btetica 

 conlairiing a single egg. On the way back we saw a single Flamingo, 

 wading in the shallow water, and the old man told Colonel Barclay 

 that he could take him close enough to it to shoot it, by using his 

 horse as a stalking-horse, so they started off. I taking charge of the 

 other horses. Stripping his horse, and leaving only a halter on it, 

 the old man kept behind the fore-quarters of the horse, the Colonel 

 doing the same behind its hind-quarters. The horse, who evidently 



Naturalist, 



