The way in which, according to the Kafirs, the native dogs worked the alligators on this narrow Zouga River amused us. Three or four of them wished to cross, either for better fare, or to see their friends on the other side; but, though alligator is very partial to dog, dog is not so fond of alligator. Assembling on the banks, they would run, barking violently, a quarter of a mile up stream in full view; halt; join in a chorus of barking, yelping, and baying; suddenly pull up in the middle of the concert, and dash at the top of their speed, absolutely mute, out of sight on a lower level, to the point they had started from, jump into the water and swim across, selling the alligators, who, hungry after their ‘course of bark,’ were eagerly expecting their dinner at the spot where they had had the largest dose. Whether this was eyes or ears, or both, I could not make out. One beast has wits, another power; and so the balance is pretty fairly kept. While still in the desert, during our first trip, Livingstone called my attention to a wonderful bit of instinct in a bird--he mentions it in his works, but it is worth telling a second time. We had been a couple of days without water, and I was enjoying watching the cattle swell themselves out in a chance thunder-shower pond we had just come to, and sitting dabbling my feet, when to me the dear old Doctor, ‘I say, what do you think is the greatest proof of conjugal affection you ever knew?’ ‘Go along, I’m not occupied with such matters.’ ‘Don’t be cross; come here. Do you see the chink in that tree, and that large horn-billed bird going backwards and forwards to it? What do you think he’s doing?‘ ‘Oh, making a fool of himself generally.’ ‘No, he’s feeding his wife and his children, who are shut in behind it.’ And it was so. The ornithological name of the bird I don’t know, but he’s something between a toucan and a hornbill, neither one nor the other, about the size of a large pigeon, though, if I remember right, more like a woodpecker in build. After marriage the birds select a hole in a tree, and gather a few sticks for a nest; the hen takes some feathers off her breast to line it and lays her eggs. When this is done, and incubation begins, the male bird goes to the nearest pond, and brings wet clay, with which he stops up the hole at which his wife went in, leaving one narrow opening in the centre, and through this the excellent fellow feeds mamma and little ones, until the latter are fledged and ready to leave the nest, then he and she, from outside and in, jointly peck away the clay, which has by this time under the dry heat become as hard as a brick, and madame and her family make their _début_. The poor monsieur is a rickle of bones, madame as round as a ball; the Kafirs, knowing this, always dig her out as a tit-bit whenever they find the nest. And what’s it done for? An African wood is filled with all sorts of cats, and without a protection the toucan