Emil Holub

“ The endless swarms of Swallows have united into a single mighty cloud. Who could count them? The air is filled with them and with the noise they make with wings and voices. The swarm of more than hundreds of thousands moves up and down, to and fro, lowering itself quickly down to the reeds and rising just as swiftly high up into the air ”

“ As our eyes glance over the blue slfy above, adorned here and there with a few light, feathery clouds, glad in the golden-crimson of the sun’s last farewell greetings, we perceive in the far distance, near the horizon and on all sides, a few darkish spots. Is it a delusion or not that they come nearer? We look hither and thither and it seems as if these spots become larger; they appear to approach. And they are approaching; they darken and are rapidly increasing in their breadth. Are they not swarms of locusts? ”

“ Every year, from October to March, through the eleven years of my sojourn in South Africa, and in the very midst of the southern summer, I have seen these Swallows hunting up and down the endless plains, destroying vast numbers of the myriads of southern insects, and uniting every evening into swarms of thousands, in some spots of hundreds of thousands, to seek their resting-places for the night. ”

“ The locusts come with the wind and pass over in a single dark cloud, darkest just above the ground; but those approaching clouds come from all directions. Some fly very high in the air, others from twenty to fifty yards high, others again move—as you can see—along the wavy grass; and suddenly this one cloud—now surely it is a swarm of birds—swerves aloft. Birds! Behold,—are they all birds, these approaching clouds? Yes, they are, and, to our great surprise, small, dark birds. We watch two of these large swarms, which from due north are making straight for us. ”

“ This marsh, about 900 yards in diameter, with a deep rocky cavern in its centre, is worthy of the admiration of mankind; it is a place offering any amount of important observations upon bird-life to every lover of natural science, but it is especially attractive to an ornithologist who wishes to learn and to study, and who does not come to destroy birds and thus make his visit a mercenary matter. ”

“ Our friends, the Swallows, rise after a good deal of squabbling about the dreams of the night past; they leave in small swarms—as I think, those coming from certain European districts keeping together for the whole time of their African sojourn—and make at once for the different portions of that endless plain, on which they are accustomed to hunt day after day. But they do not rise high up in the air to fly in any particular direction ”

“ Wherever we look the swarms are fast approaching; the grand sight of the confluence of two multitudes of birds just witnessed repeats itself on all sides. Quicker, dear reader, than I am able to express to you in words, most of these living clouds, at times overshot with a gleam of reddish sheen, the reflection of some real clouds still beaming in crimson on the far western horizon, have united in ten large swarms—no, in eight only ”

“ But most numerous of all are the graceful springbucks, Antidorcas euchore, which in herds of hundreds in all directions are to be seen; many of them, unruly in their playfulness, leap up eight feet above the ground, bounding one over the other. ”

“ It is commmonly known that the European Swallow winters in Northern Africa, but it may be known to few that by far the largest number of this species migrate to the southern portions of the Dark Continent. ”

“ They are everywhere in country which has no communication with the ocean, and are commonly called “saltpans,” being the lowest places in southern portions of the high plateau—the reservoir for rain-water. ”

“ The marsh is inhabited by numerous birds. Many species of singers and Finches, many more of wading and swimming birds, nest among the tall reeds, making this only marshy thicket in the vast plain their home for the whole year through ”