BLUE NILE AND BINDER RIVER 
315 
hung- foliage, with broken lights, lent a quality of mystery 
to the great contorted roots beneath—as seen in shade, 
their convolutions re¬ 
sembled the writhings of 
some huge saurians of 
geologic period. 
Upon each stretch of 
open water floated flotillas 
of ducks—pintail, wigeon, 
shoveler, teal, garganey, 
pochard (probably Nyroca) 
■—while the shallows and 
foreshores teemed with 
waders, varying in size 
from giant marabou and 
crowned cranes down to the tiniest stints (Tringa 
minuta ); and the trees above were crowded with fish- 
eagles, storks, open-bills, egrets, ibises, and the rest of 
that Ethiopian ilk. It is unnecessary here to catalogue 
the whole assembly; though a few of the less usual 
deserve a note. Black-tailed godwits were probing up to 
their ears in rotten ooze, 
and with them an avocet 
—the only bird of its kind 
I ever saw in the Sudan. 
Together with innumer¬ 
able ruffs and reeves, were 
greenshanks, green and 
marsh-sandpipers (Totanus 
stagnatilis ), as well as the 
curious white-tailed lap¬ 
wing (Vanellus leucurus ), 
a counterpart — save in 
colour—of our familiar peewit at home, but striking in 
respect to its marked “assimilation to environment.” 
Detailed investigation of a focal point such as this 
would obviously entail a sojourn of some days; but any 
White-tailed. Lapwing. 
