544 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIII. No. 588. 



up by the boots ; a bullet well placed, and tliat 

 quickly, cau only check the fury of the beast, 

 and there may be more than one adversary 

 with which to reckon. Possessed of such a 

 wonderful scent, together with certain other 

 habits which are described, not to speak of 

 memory, it is not surprising that they seem 

 to possess such unerring knowledge of the velt. 



Many interesting facts in natural history 

 are recorded in the pictures and text. The 

 South African ostrich breeds in September 

 and October, and nests were found with eight 

 to twenty-five eggs during those months, while 

 a single egg was taken from the ovary of a 

 female shot at the end of February. This 

 sporadic activity of the reproductive organs 

 outside of the breeding season, attributed to 

 excessive feeding on newly sprouted grass, was 

 often observed by the natives, who frequently 

 found single eggs scattered over the velt. 

 Many similar cases among our own wild birds 

 could be given. 



The common stork, Ciconia ciconia, which 

 winters in vast numbers in equatorial East 

 Africa, were preparing to migrate in early 

 February, while some even remained until the 

 first of April. On April 2, 1904, I saw great 

 numbers of these storks, on the desert in 

 Nubia above the first cataract of the Nile, 

 huddled together like a dense flock of sheep. 

 They were very wary and would not allow 

 even a rider to approach them. Five days 

 later the advance guard had reached Edfu, 

 sixty miles northward, and were fraternizing 

 with Arabs in the ploughed fields. Though 

 bound for Europe, they appeared to be ad- 

 vancing at the leisurely pace of twelve to fif- 

 teen miles a day. 



Schillings speaks of hawks ' seizing locusts 

 on the wing, of ' sign-post ' trees of elephants, 

 or rubbing places, some of which he thinks 

 mtist have been in use for hundreds of years : 

 of the sleeping places of hippopotami on 

 islands, ' which seem to have been in use for 

 ages,' and their deep-worn paths leading down 

 to the water; of the tail-language and dumb- 

 ness of the giraffe, the harmony of the zebra's 

 stripes with the coloring of the velt, the cun- 

 ning of the ostrich in enticing the lion from 

 its nest and young, the alarm-calls of the reed- 



bucks heeded by birds, the watchfulness of 

 the yellow baboons, and their wonderful alert- 

 ness in fiight, the tameability and affection of 

 the marabou storks, the attachment which 

 sprung up between a young rhinoceros and an 

 East African goat, and the often fatal policy 

 of first shooting at the lion Avhen the lioness 

 is near. 



The connection between malaria and mos- 

 quitoes is well illustrated by the following 

 account of the usual sequel to a night of 

 shooting and photographing on the velt, al- 

 though the very brief incubation here sug- 

 gested does not accord with the common type 

 of this disease: 



When the morning breaks I return to the camp, 

 feeling as if broken to pieces, stung all over by 

 mosquitoes, and with that peculiar sensation 

 which unmistakably heralds an attack of fever. 

 I was not deceived, and for two days I am con- 

 fined to camp by a bad attack of malaria. 



The water-famine in the dry season, the 

 terrible pests of mosquitoes and files of many 

 kinds, which the traveler to the Nile valley in 

 March and April should be able to appreciate, 

 the scourge of malaria and dysentery follow- 

 ing in their wake, not to speak of many other 

 enemies which make the white man's burden 

 well-nigh insupportable on the velt, will for 

 long postpone the day when Herr Schillings's 

 studies on the general natural history and 

 photography of animals in equatorial East 

 Africa are equaled or surpassed. 



Francis H. Herrick. 



fiOIENTIFW JOURNALS AND ARTICLES. 



The Journal of Comparative Neurology for 

 March contains the following articles : Mar- 

 garet F. Washburn and I. Madison Bentley, 

 ' The Establishment of an Association Involv- 

 ing Color-Discrimination in the Creek Chub, 

 Semotilus atromaculatus.' An association in- 

 volving the discrimination of red from green 

 in the feeding reactions was quickly estab- 

 lished under rigid experimental control. H. 

 H. Newman, ' The Habits of Certain Tor- 

 toises.' Detailed observations upon five Amer- 

 ican fresh-water species. T. H. Boughton, 

 ' The Increase in the Number and Size of the 



