THE OAR-FOOTED SEA-FLIERS. 



229 



difficult to procure specimens ; all that is requisite is to find out the trees upon which they sleep 

 and towards evening to take up a position in the vicinity and patiently await their coming. When 

 one of them is shot, all the survivors tumble, as if dead, into the water below, where they immediately 

 dive, and when they come up again, only show their necks above the surface ; moreover they generally 

 ensconce themselves among the floating weeds, where they are hidden from observation. The Prince 



v. v ir. 



LE VAILLANT'S SNAKE BIRD, OR DARTER (PlotUS Levaillantii). 



von Wied, when travelling in Brazil, tried to shoot Anhingas from a boat, laying himself down at the 

 bottom, and allowing it to float with the stream until he came close to some of them, at which he 

 instantly fired; he found, however, that it was easier to waste his shot than to kill the birds, as their 

 bodies were completely hidden in the water, and to hit their slender necks before they could be 

 withdrawn was a very different matter. Dr. Bachmann gives the following interesting account of two 

 Snake Birds which he brought home and kept with a view to taming them : — 



"While these two birds," he says, " were yet in the same cage, it was curious indeed to see the 



