TWELFTH DAY, 195 
being high time that I did so, for I had still a very wide 
extent of country to explore. Having got back to the cart I 
drove a little further along the borders of the wood, and then 
turned into a broad and perfectly straight road, the only one 
which traverses the entire length of the Kovil forest. 
Throughout its course it runs through dense: scrub, low, 
almost impenetrable copses, and high woods, and being 
bordered by ditches on both sides shows a certain trace of 
human care. I must have driven along it for another good 
half-hour before Hodek begged me to leave the cart and to 
enter the wood by a narrow footpath, which led away from 
the road in an easterly direction. 
This track at first took us through bushes and across little 
glades, where there was everywhere plenty of life; for Warblers, 
Thrushes, Finches, Buntings, Orioles, Turtle-Doves, and 
Cuckoos were uttering their various notes and flitting 
merrily about among the branches, while the thickets kept 
getting still denser, and a few thin ugly oaks rose above 
them. 
On one of these oaks stood the large well-built nest of a 
Sea-Hagle, and I could hardly have believed it possible that 
so large a bird could have constructed so heavy a nest on 
such a slender miserable tree; but a dearth of more suitable 
places had compelled it to do so. This was the only Sea- 
Eagle’s nest which we discovered in the woods round Kovil. 
Unfortunately the herdsmen, who wander about with their 
flocks all day long, had: made this pair of eagles quite shy 
and unapproachable with their pistol-shots; for as soon as tke 
birds detected us they rose high in the air and circled round 
uttering their ominous screams of alarm; and though I crouched 
down below the nest, well concealed among the thick bushes, 
and waited for a good hour, the shy creatures never left the 
place for a moment, but kept wheeling overhead at a uniform 
height, looking down at me all the while. I had thus an 
02 
