4 
24 RAMBLES OF A NATURALIST. 
their best) are to be had for 3,000 francs; any higher price that 
may be paid is money thrown away. Very fair horses may be 
hired at £5 per month, the livery-stableman keeping them and 
providing saddles and bridles. Good servants are very difficult to 
obtain, especially for short periods. A thorough good cook earns 
nearly at the rate of £30 per annum. 
W.P.B. (Algiers, April oth, 1873.) 
“For asportsman Algiers, or rather its vicinity, affords excellent 
shooting; Snipe and Duck, golden and grey [?] Plover, being the 
principal winter game; and in spring great quantity of Quail can 
be got. I remember killing ten brace of Quail in a few hours. 
* * * * * * 
“Within two days’ journey of Algiers there is a large lake called 
Lac Alloula, where capital sport can be had. It is covered with 
wild duck in the winter with a good supply of geese and wild 
swans, and the margin of the lake is full of Snipe—a friend and 
myself killing forty couple of Snipe and several Bittern in a few 
hours. * * * * * * 
Waverley. (Oct. 21st, 1872.) 
For a graphic account of this lake, and the ornithological 
treasures to be had there, see the “Ibis” for 1860, p. 149. 
I procured from Madame Loche (the widow of the dis- 
tinguished ornithologist) a Golden Eagle (Aguila chrysaetos), 
which had been killed at Arba, twenty miles distant from 
Algiers, about three months before. I also saw another 
alive. Captain Loche had several, but they, with other 
Accipitres to the number of 180, perished in the following 
manner. An earthquake occasioned the fall of an immense 
wall, beneath which was the “fauconnerie,” and alas! it 
buried in its debris the precious birds which it had taken the 
Captain ten years to collect. 
The adventures I had in getting a “permis de chasse” 
were quite as amazing as Canon Tristram’s. It did not cost 
so much as an English game license, but the number of 
officials whose signatures were necessary was something 
