i57



Diary of Birds seen on the White Nile.



I have made a curious little sleeping box for him, like a

tunnel, an opening at each end, and when the lights are lit he

is very restless and unhappy until this contrivance is put into

his cage, when he at once disappears from view and is seriously

annoyed if I turn him out for a fly about the room.


His is a far more formidable beak than Blue’s, and so quick

are his movements that he can draw blood three times from my

finger by rapid “ hammerings” before I can stop him, but, barring

this trick of hammering me at times, which he only does when

very angry, he is one of the most delightful of companions.


I made the tunnel sleeping box for him as I found that

whenever he got tired of flying about the room he would take

refuge under the card back of a photograph frame, or under a

book if he was luckly enough to find one overlapping another on

the table, or behind a sofa cushion, anywhere, in fact, where he

could have something over and near his head, hence the sleeping

box and apparently great happiness and satisfaction to Billy.


My happiness would be greater if Billy and Blue would

become friends and companions, but that, I fear, is a Utopian

state which will never be. Billy is curiously attracted by a sight

of himself in the looking-glass ; he throws his head back, draws

himself up to his full height and whistles defiance to his supposed

enemy. Blue, on the other hand, takes no notice of his own re¬

flection—this may mean that he possesses more reasoning powers

than Billy—but personally I put it down to want of imagination.

I must not belittle Blue, but the real fact is that Billy is the one

that has my heart, but perhaps that is because he is my very own

and Blue is only a lodger.



DIARY OF BIRDS SEEN ON THE WHITE NILE.


By Richard Stapees-Browne.


Part I.


On January iotli of last year I left Cairo for Khartum,

where I was due on February ist, to join the Soudan Govern¬

ment’s steamer “ Amara,” which was starting for a tour on the

White Nile. The steamer was to proceed up the main stream as

far as Kio, and then pass through the Balir el Zeraf, the channel



