RETURN TO LAKE ASHANGI. 93 



ground with only about seven species of animals not 

 obtained elsewhere. These comprised a peculiar hyrax, 

 the little Mus abyssinicus, Saxicola frenata, Pratincola 

 sordida, the rare Lohivanellus melanocephalus,Macronyx 

 jiavicollis, and Euplectes xantJiomelas. Had I been 

 al)le to devote more time to the exploration of these hills, 

 I might doubtless have increased the number consider- 

 ably, and have obtained a larger proportion still of the 

 peculiar forms described by Eiippell and Von Heuglin 

 from the mountains of Samyen. 



This being out of the question, however, I pushed on to 

 Lake Ashangi. On my road I obtained two or three more 

 specimens of birds on the top of Wandaj,- including 

 Falco tanypterus, which I had frequently seen before but 

 never secured. I also saw Hypotriorchis concolor, the 

 slate-coloured merlin, of which I did not secure a speci- 

 men. Close to Dildi I shot one of the mouse-coloured 

 antelopes, Cephalophus madoqua. 



The released prisoners from Magdala were on their 

 march towards the coast, and I met several of them, 

 amongst them Dr. Schimper, the veteran naturalist, who 

 has passed forty years in exploring the botany, zoology, 

 and geology of the country. He was a fellow-student 

 with Agassiz, and having remained so long away from 

 European changes of thought, has retained the geological 

 ideas of a past generation, differing from those of the 

 present less perhaps in reality than in nomenclature, so 

 that I found some difficulty in understanding his views. 

 Although, so far as I am aware, he has published nothing 

 himself, he has supplied many successive travellers with 



