SIX MONTHS’ BIRD COLLECTING IN EGYPT. 1or 
never observed any. Going along the edge of a field one 
day in the Delta, I met three large Ichneumons following 
one another up a rut, their backs appearing and disappear- 
ing as the waving corn—then about six inches high—was 
bent down by the wind. On several occasions we came 
upon these creatures—always unexpectedly, which was 
probably why we never shot one. At Assouan I bought 
a Monkey’s skin, probably brought from Soudan. At the 
Faioum a Hedgehog was offered to us. 
Bats.  Woofwat.” 
Egypt with its rock-cut tombs and temples, is a great 
country for Bats. As I did not know their names, I could 
only distinguish them by size. There was one very small 
species, smaller than our Pipistrelle; another somewhat 
larger went in flocks. Perhaps this is the species which 
attacks the Palms; I was told at Damietta that they 
suffered greatly, and that men were employed to search out 
the Bats systematically and kill them. Ina tomb at Siout 
Isaw about 200 of the largest size, and shot a male and 
female ; the former, which was the larger, measured twenty- 
two inches from tip to tip. I also saw hundreds of Long- 
tailed Bats go down a hole at Beni Hassen. 
In the square, one afternoon in June, at Alexandria, there 
were many which had come out before their usual hour, and 
they were flying so low that the coachmen were hitting at 
them with their whips. 
FISH. 
The fish of the Nile are poor and unpalatable, though 
they grow to a large size. I saw one enormous creature 
dead at Girgeh; it must have weighed 100 pounds. Two 
’ Griffons were watching its decomposition with an appearance 
