34 WILD-FOWL 



waterbuck, zebra, and several other varieties 

 of game, whilst the deeper imprints of the 

 footmarks of the hippopotamus clove great 

 seams in the somewhat higher levels of the soft 

 soil from which the great rushes sprang. Follow- 

 ing this tunnel cautiously, I soon saw the water 

 beyond ; the surface so covered with great 

 water-lily leaves and other aquatic plants that 

 it appeared almost like dry land save tor certain 

 unmistakable indications which I am about to 

 describe. The open space before me might have 

 covered some twenty or thirty acres, surrounded 

 on all sides by the same high reed belt which, 

 narrowing together at each visible extremity 

 of the pool, opened out again beyond one's 

 range of vision, where the water deepened to 

 surround further and probably larger expanses 

 which were hidden, as it were, round the corner. 

 As I came to the end of my friendly tunnel, 

 and my feet began to sink more deeply in the 

 rapidly thinning ooze, 1 became aware that the 

 surface of the water was alive with fowl. Those 

 near at hand had already observed me, and 

 had begun to swim slowly towards the centre. 

 Wherever my eyes swept the surface I saw 

 nothing but scores upon scores ot upstanding 

 anatide ^ heads. I remember making out, as 

 I watched them (for I am extracting the list 

 from my field notebook wherein I made it on 

 my return to camp), both black and ordinary 

 spur-winged geese, dwarf geese, ducks of both 

 the red and black varieties, white-backed duck, 



1 A new word is clearly demanded here. 



