THE LIFE OF THE ABARY SAVANNAS. 35 I 



The land along the coast is all flat savanna, dotted for 

 the first half of the journey with tumbled down coolie huts 

 and tiny dyked fields of pale green young rice. Later for 

 some distance these give place to large groves of cocoanuts. 

 On the left, stretch the seawall dykes, relics of Dutch in- 

 dustry, perfected by the English. 



Throughout the entire journey, hundreds, sometimes 

 thousands of birds were in sight, often for several miles in 

 succession; but as exactly similar scenes were later visible 

 and at closer range on our up-river trip, I will not repeat 

 myself. 



The train was stopped for our benefit at the bridge across 

 the so-called Abary River, which proved to be a little stream 

 only about a hundred and twenty-five feet wide. Load- 

 ing our luggage and ourselves into a fussy little launch we 

 chugged up-river for three hours. 



Along the right bank — the leeward — for most of the dis- 

 tance, grew an irregular fringe of bushes and low trees. Be- 

 yond, almost to the horizon, stretched the vast savanna, 

 covered with reeds, rushes and tall coarse grass, each a \)uie 

 culture in its place of occurrence. 



Scattered over this great expanse were myriads of birds 

 of many species, the only other visible living creatures being 

 a small herd of half-wild catde here and there. 



For the first few miles two species predominated — as they 

 had almost all the way from Georgetown — the Little Yellow- 

 headed '^' and the Red-breasted Blackbirds.'"' Few more 

 beautiful sights can be imagined than a cloud of these birds 

 rising ahead of the train or launch, and scattering far and 

 wide over and through the reeds. The general color of both 

 is a rich black, which itself contrasts strongly with the green 

 of the savanna. But when we add to this the brilliant yel- 

 low head and neck of the former and the scarlet throats, 

 breasts and wing edges of the latter, the color scheme is one 



