THE CORMORANT 193 
as true of bird life as any other. Elsewhere I 
have referred to the beauty and charm of Lake 
Menzaleh to all naturalists, and I do really think 
that to get anything like a complete view of 
Egyptian bird life a visit ought to be paid to some 
one or other of the lakes, and of course Menzaleh 
is far and away the best and biggest. But though I 
suggest a visit, I would not care to have it under- 
stood I recommend it as a health resort or place to 
live in. I write this here, because there are two 
considerable Cormorant rookeries or breeding- 
stations that I visited on Lake Menzaleh—there 
may be others I did not find, but these two I did 
find, and they will ever live in my memory as the 
most poisonous plots of earth I have ever stood on. 
I have been to Cormorant rookeries before, and well 
know that they don’t smell like rose-gardens. The 
peculiarity of this great lake is, that it is, and 
always has been, a great drainage-bed for the whole 
of Egypt. The result of having been a drainage- 
bed for all these untold years is that when you 
stick a pole, or your oar, into the mud and then 
pull it out, you seem to all at once take the 
cork out of a bottle containing the most appal- 
ling stinks and gases that ever were engendered. 
One day I was stalking Cormorants on a long flat 
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