on Some Birds of the White Nile. 317


Near the Sobat, which joins the Nile near Tewfikieh, we

steamed through a small flock of Pelicans which were almost too

lazy to get out of our way.


On January 24th we arrived at a place where the Nile

divides into the Bahr el Gebel and Bahr el Ghazal. We followed

the first river, and soon came to the district where the river loses

itself in immense marshes 40,000 square miles in extent.


The steamer threads its way through a series of lagoons

for about 25 miles, when the river again becomes visible. The

real river bed is being searched for, and cleansed of sudd, (a

vegetable block of papyrus and tall weedy grass), by two English

naval officers and a large number of natives working under them.

They invited us to join them on their gunboat for the day, and we

went through the newly-cleared channel with them. The last

few miles is not clear, and we had to charge several times at the

masses of floating sudd before it gave way, and was pushed

aside, or steamed over by our powerful stern wheeler. During

the day we saw many beautiful water birds, Brown and Black

Waders (/). Two kinds of Black and White Kingfishers

Pratincoles, and, most curious of all to see in Central Africa,

countless numbers of Terns, or Sea Swallows.


I saw one bird very like Balceniceps, but there is another

big-headed Stork in these parts. The bird I saw was flying,

and Storks are then hard to distinguish (k ). There seemed to

be four kinds of Ibis, black, white, black-and-white, and a

beautiful kind, white with just the edges of its wings black (/).


Some days after this while strolling on the banks while the

steamer was taking in wood for fuel, I saw Firefinches and many

Weavers. Nearly every tree had a pair of Fish Eagles nesting

on it. One shot and brought on board measured 6ft. between the

points of the outstretched wings (pi).


At Fado one touches Congo Free State territory, and the

Belgian Commandant, who is a great collector of birds, gave me

a pair of small Parrots, which I afterwards ascertained to be



(/). Opeu-billed Storks, Anastonms lamelligerus.


(A). The Senegal Tabiru or Saddlebill, Ephippiorhyncus senegalensis.

(/). The Sacred Ibis. (m). Haliaetus vocifer.



