To realise all this one must in fancy place oneself in the condition of exaggerated susceptibility to nervous excitement that results from the intensity of the light, together with the climate, and the unusual degree of hardship. All this produces the greater effect because one has to do one’s work in solitude and loneliness, and is cut off from all interchange of ideas with one’s fellows. Here, where the flora makes so poor a display, the fauna is abundant. What a sight it affords for the ornithologists! [Illustration: _C. G. Schillings, phot._ MASAI WARRIORS, ARMED WITH THE LONG SPEARS WHICH HAVE COME INTO USE WITH THEM DURING THE LAST GENERATION OR TWO. IN FORMER DAYS, ACCORDING TO HOLLIS, THEY USED SPEARS WITH SHORTER BLADES.] Amongst the herds of zebras our European stork together with its smaller African cousin, the Abdim stork, is stalking in hundreds over the plain hunting for locusts. In company with the storks I saw also great flocks of the handsome crested crane engaged in the same occupation. Or they rose in heavy flocks over the valleys with loud and strangely discordant cries. Under the scanty shadows of the mimosas the splendid giant bustards take their stand at midday, erect, solemn, stiff-necked. At this time they are not very wary, but in the coolness of the morning and in the evening hours they soon get away to a safe distance, either running with their quick mincing step, or spreading their strong pinions for a short flight along the ground. Their smaller relative, _Otis gindiana_, Oust., rose before me in the air, often throwing somersaults on the wing like a tumbler pigeon. There is hardly any other bird of its size that has such a mastery of flight. Sea-eagles circled by the margin of the lake uttering their beautiful clear-sounding cries. Heedless of their presence thousands of splendid rose-red flamingoes soared up into the deep blue dome of the sky, or lined the margin of Nakuro, like a garland of living lake-roses, in company with great flocks of ducks, geese, and waterside birds of many kinds. Out of the clumps of acacias, and from between the thickets of ‘msuaki bush by the lake, guinea fowl and francolins rise, strung out in clattering flying lines, and in the morning hours handsome sandfowl that have come from far-off regions of the plateau sail by the margin of the lake. Altogether an overwhelmingly rich picture of warmly pulsating life and activity! The sight of it all is indeed quite capable of impressing one with the idea of flocks of wild creatures that have been completely tamed; and once this idea has suggested itself, the impression is so strong that for many minutes one can believe in it! Amidst all this wealth of “wild” life, which here seems hardly to deserve the name of “wild,” it is much easier to understand how primitive man in other continents gradually secured domestic animals for his use, from the vast range of choice thus presented to him.