106 RAMBLES OF A NATURALIST. 
life beyond that, according to my experience, save perchance 
at its very fringe a few Chats, and the Crested Lark which 
is omnipresent; but nothing, I am convinced, to repay a 
long and weary trudge into the Sahara. It is not the 
desert, it is the ripening barley and the strips of lentils 
which will tempt the sportsman and beguile him to keep the 
Diabeyha waiting with a favourable wind, for these teem 
with Quails so fat, so tender, and so luscious, as to more 
than merit the high praise which has been bestowed on 
them. It would give an English yeoman a fit to see the 
ffowadjas walking through the standing crops, but not a 
word does the farmer of Egypt say. He looks on with 
perfect indifference: no complaint escapes him. Even a 
smile lights up his stolid face, and he appears to be inwardly 
applauding when his tame Pigeons go by, and a successful 
shot brings them down. Different races have different 
ways. Truly de gustibus, etc. But he really cannot stand 
it when the Howadja walks among his water-melons for a 
paltry Rufous Warbler, and he does feel called upon to 
object to his trampling down such valuable plants for such 
insignificant game. Accordingly it is only due to him that 
his wrath should be appeased with a dackshish of powder, a 
present more acceptable than the copper alloy coins, of 
which every dragoman thinks it necessary to bring a 
sackful. ss 
All this time there has not been a cloud overhead, and 
only a close scrutiny into the clear blue sky will reveal the 
Griffon Vultures which circle far up, like dots, in the vault 
of heaven; yet nothing escapes them from their dizzy 
height. If there be a carcass or any putrid matter about a 
village, the Neophrons are the first to find it out, by their 
eyes and not by their nostrils. “Pharaoh’s Hens” are a 
marked feature in the zoology of Egypt, and valued for 
their sanitary qualities, for they are the birds which preserve 
the public health by clearing away the filth and festering 
