VOYAGE UP WHITE NILE 
67 
A few minutes later the sun arose. In his early rays 
a thousand mimosa-trunks gleamed crimson-red against 
massed green and golden foliage ; a pair of hornbills 
(special favourites of mine) fluttered, flopped, and tumbled 
in eccentric flight; a row of brilliant bee-eaters posed 
along a bough ; the murmurations of doves filled the still 
air, and a pair of the lovely spot-winged species almost 
brushed my face in wanton play-—all Nature was gay, 
and my spirits revived. 
Of course we followed the lion’s spoor for miles, the 
“Flutter, Flop, and Tumble.” 
Hornbills in Kordofan—January 28th, 1913. 
Baggara proving wondrous apt at tracking. Slowly he 
had moved forward into a region of dense bush bordered 
beyond by lagoons white with pelicans. Soon all trace 
was lost. It was while following the lion-spoor this 
morning that we noticed the curious fact (more particu¬ 
larly referred to later) that close by where the beast of 
prey had passed only a few minutes before, groups of 
gazelles still grazed undisturbed. Incidentally we ascer¬ 
tained (on this and other occasions) that these Kordofan 
forests are, in places, of no great depth interiorly—rather 
they consist of a series of broad riverain belts of wood, 
expanding locally into double or treble zones, intercepted 
with strips of marsh or prairie. These forests abound 
