THE SHOEBILL OR WHALE- 
HEADED STORK 
Balaeniceps rex 
Arabic name, Abu-markub, or Father of a Slipper 
The whole plumage is a faded blue-grey running into 
darker tones on the wing. The primaries and tail being 
nearly black, eyes light yellow, legs dark brownish-black. 
Bill, huge, boat-shaped. 
Tuis bird I have included, though hardly a true 
Egyptian bird, its home being in the Soudan and 
south to Uganda, where Sir H. Johnston commonly 
saw it. It is the greatest show-bird the Cairo 
Zoological Gardens possesses, and by the ordinary 
person can be alone seen in Egypt. It is so 
exceedingly quaint and grotesque, that even when 
desiring to give an accurate representation of it, 
one is conscious that one’s drawing seems to look 
rather like a caricature. When it stands still there 
is something suggestive of a crabbed, disagreeable 
old person; and when it walks, the slow pedantic 
gait with the leg shot forward, with distended toes 
pointing outwards, inevitably suggests the drum- 
major or the dancing-master. So many people 
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