1 72 ABUNDANCE OF ANIMAL LIFE. Chap. :CIV 



stations and outlying hamlets, followed by an uninhabited 

 border country, intervene between it and Londa, or Ltmda. 

 Libonta, like the rest of the villages in the Barotse valley, is 

 situated on a mound. It belongs to two of the chief wives of 

 Sebituane, who furnished us with an ox and abundance of other 

 food. The same kindness was manifested by all who could 

 afford to give an} T thing; and as I glance over their deeds of 

 generosity recorded in my journal, my heart glows with grati- 

 tude to them, and I hope and pray that God may spare me to 

 make them some return. 



When quite beyond the inhabited parts we found the 

 country abounding in animal life of every form. There are 

 upwards of thirty species of birds on the river itself, among 

 which we may notice as most common the Ibis religiosa, which 

 comes down the Zambesi with the rising water, as on the Nile ; 

 large white pelicans, appearing in flocks of three hundred at 

 a time, in long waving lines ; clouds of a black shell-eating 

 bird, called linongolo (Anastomus lamelligerus) ; and plovers, 

 snipes, curlews, and herons, without number. 



Some of the rarer varieties also deserve notice, such as the 

 pretty white ardetta, which settles on the backs of buffaloes, 

 and follows them on the wing when they run; the kala 

 (Textor en/throrhynchus), which sits on the withers when the 

 animal is at full speed ; and those strange birds, the scissor- 

 bills, with snow-white breast, jet-black coat, and red beak, 

 which sit on the sandbanks, the very picture of comfort and 

 repose. Their nests are made on the sandbanks without any 

 attempt at concealment ; they watch them closely, and frighten 

 away the marabou and crows by feigned attacks at their 

 heads, but when a man approaches they change their tactics, 

 and, like the lapwing and ostrich, let one wing drop and limp 

 with one leg as if lame. The upper mandible being so much 

 shorter than the lower, the young require to have everything 

 conveyed to their mouths by their parents. The lower man- 

 dible, as thin as a paper-knife, is put into the water while the 

 bird skims along the surface and scoops up any little insects it 

 meets. The wonder is, how this process can oe so well per- 

 formed as to yield a meal, for it is usually done in the dark, 

 the time when insects and fishes rise to the suiface. One pretty 

 little wader, an avoset, with very long legs, and its bill bent 



