6b AFRICA AND ITS EXPLORATION. 
Thunberg, and Paterson. To this list we must now add 
the name of the ornithologist Le Vaillant. 
Born at Paramaribo, in Dutch Guiana, of French 
parents, who traded in birds, Le Vaillant visited Europe 
with them as a mere child, and traversed Holland, Ger- 
THE WEAVER-BIRD’S NEST. 
many, Lorraine, and the Vosges, on his way to Paris. 
It will readily be understood that this wandering life 
awoke in him a taste for travelling ; and his passion for 
birds, early excited by the examination of private and 
public collections, made him eager to enrich science by 
descriptions and drawings of unknown species. 
Now what country would afford the richest ornitho- 
