Village Life in Pongo-land ’ 163 
part of tropical Africa known to me have the 
people tamed the only gallinaceous bird which the 
Black Continent has contributed to civilization. 
The Guinea fowl, like the African elephant, re¬ 
mains wild. We know it to be an old importation 
in Europe, although there are traditions about its 
appearing in the fourteenth century, when Moslems 
sold it to Christians as the Jerusalem cock,” and 
Christians to Moslems as the “bird of Meccah.” It 
must be the Greek meleagris, so called, says ./Elian, 
from the sisters who wept a brother untimely slain ; 
hence the tears upon its plume, suggesting the 
German Perl-huhn, and its frequent cries, which the 
Brazilians, who are great in the language of birds, 
translate Sto fraca , sto fraca, sto fraca (I’m weak). 
The Hausa Moslems make the Guinea fowl 
cry, “ Kilkal ! kilkal !” (Grammar by the Rev. 
F. J. Schon, London, Salisbury Square, 1862). It 
is curious to compare the difference of ear with 
which nations hear the cries of animals, and form 
their onomatopoetic, or “ bow-wow ” imitations. 
For instance, the North Americans express by 
“whip-poor-will” what the Brazilians call “Joao- 
corta-pao.” The Guinea fowl may have been the 
“ Afraa avis ;” but that was a dear luxury amongst 
the Romans, though the Greek meleagris was 
cheap. The last crotchet about it is that of an 
African traveller, who holds it to be the peacock 
of Solomon’s navies, completely ignoring the 
