Lakes of salt or brackish water in the vicinity of sea-coasts are the favourite resorts of the Flamingoes. To lakes of fresh water they are only casual visitants, and never resort to them for any length of time. On the other hand, they are always very abundant on the sea-coast, more especially where the shores are flat and swampy. All are birds of passage, and the migrations of some occur with such regularity that the period of their return may be predicted with tolerable accuracy. According to Cetti, Flamingoes appear in Sardinia about the middle of August, and depart thence in March or the beginning of April. In South Italy they are stationary, remaining in the same locality all the year round. Only those who have had the good fortune to see these birds assembled in flocks, consisting of many thousands, can form an adequate idea of the beauty of their appearance. "Looking from Cagliari to the sea," says Cetti, "it seemed to be banked in with a wall of red bricks, or to be covered with countless numbers of roses. On nearer approach these proved to be Flamingoes ranged in regular ranks. Aurora herself was never adorned with more roseate tints than the wings of these birds, they seemed literally to glow with pink and carmine. The name of the Flamingo, both in Greek and Latin, was derived from the magnificent hues of their glorious wings, and the French in the epithet _flammant_ only repeat the same idea. The first impression produced by such a spectacle is not easily to be forgotten; the birds stood in ranks, not merely of thousands, but literally of hundreds of thousands, ranged in interminable array. As the sunlight played upon the dazzling white and glowing red, the effect was indescribable; at length, taking alarm at something, the whole body of them rose into the air, displaying their wings to still greater advantage, as they formed themselves into an immense wedge-shaped phalanx, and winged their way far up into the blue sky." When standing quietly upon the shore, the appearance of these birds very much resembles that of an army drawn up in order of battle; the Cingalese call them "English soldier birds," the South Americans simply "soldiers," and indeed not without cause, for, as Humboldt informs us, the inhabitants of Angostura, soon after the establishment of that colony, were one day thrown into a state of great alarm by the sudden appearance of what they took to be a numerous army, and it was only when the supposed enemy took flight to the shores of the Orinoco, that they discovered their mistake. A solitary Flamingo is very rarely seen, never perhaps before the commencement of the pairing season, and even then it must be some young bird that has strayed by accident from its fellows. Usually they keep together in flocks, and carefully avoid any locality where danger might be apprehended. Open waters are usually selected as their fishing-place, and should a boat approach they at once take flight whilst it is still far off, so that it