146 EGYPTIAN BIRDS 
the reds of their legs and the golden yellow of 
the sand, and if on your nearer approach they all 
simultaneously rise together into mid-air you will 
be hardly likely to forget the scene for a whole 
lifetime. 
The Black Stork is not so interesting as the 
above, but it is a remarkably handsome bird in 
itself. All its peculiarities are just the opposite 
of the White Stork. It is not gregarious, but 
generally rather a solitary bird; it does not love 
its own species, and it certainly does not court the 
proximity of man. On the scale that our drawing 
has had to be reduced to, to suit these pages, it 
comes very small, but not too small to show the 
general disposition of the colours of its plumage. 
We came very early in the morning on this group 
standing at the end of a long sand-bar, just ten 
miles south of Sohag, and they never got up as 
the boat sailed comparatively close by them. The 
group was a very mixed one, as in addition to the 
four Black Storks there were two Spoonbills and a 
Heron ; and I find another note that once I saw 
three Black Storks, one White Stork, and several 
Herons all in a bunch together, this also in the grey 
of an early March morning. These two cases of a 
