Ha-Moufih--You understand George's badinage, and you also understand that I do not mean to chide you. On the contrary I am surprised and delighted with your docile and matter-of-fact manner of accommodating yourself to an experience that well might overwhelm you. Lois[a:] Rûmēs[a:] is about one hundred and forty miles long and nearly one-third as wide. On the west its waters wash the base of a low, picturesque mountain range named Diaf[a:]-avin[a:] (many hued), which, from northward to southward extends the entire length of the lake, thence curving eastward it grades itself into inconsiderable hills, which at length are lost in an irrigated fertile plain. Your friends contemplate showing you Lois[a:] Rûmēs[a:], but I shall not have the pleasure of accompanying you. For seven days we remained on its northern shore where nearby was some herbage for our animals, and constantly we were on the lookout for the great birds. Each succeeding day brought us only disappointment, yet did not lessen our ardor or determination to find them. Then, slowly, for three days we journeyed along the eastern shore when again we encamped amid a broken, fertile space of considerable extent. Here we found herbage and wild fruits in abundance, and such numbers and variety of birds that the air was vocal with their notes. Water fowls, too, of various kinds made of the rocky locality a breeding ground and the contents of their nests afforded a welcome addition to our food supply. During out first day in our new camp my eyes continually scanned the sky and the surface of the lake but the sun disappeared beyond the mountain, and the shadows of night, lighted by Entol[a:] and Ementol[a:] (Ento's moons) brooded over the quiet water of Lois[a:] Rûmēs[a:]. Scarcely had twilight deepened into darkness when our ears were assailed by murmuring musical sounds interspersed with harsh grating cries and sharp hisses, and by the dim moon light we perceived huge, shadowy forms, slowly descending to the quiet surface of the lake where they remained silent and apparently motionless. The night waned, and earliest dawn illuminated a scene so weirdly strange that our hearts beat with unwonted celerity. High up in the quiet air, so high, indeed that they appeared like mere shadows, ten of the great birds with wide-spreading wings sailed in circles or were as motionless as the stars, which yet were shining dimly. So startling, so unusual was the spectacle that our attendants were quite alarmed; even our animals grew restless, crowding together in evident terror. As dawn brightened into day and the sun arose above the horizon the creatures slowly and with the same peculiar humming sound, descended to the bosom of the lake where, for a time, they were rocked by the undulating waves, then, in a body, they arose to a great height and flew westward. During fourteen days they came at nightfall and in the morning disappeared, always in the same direction from which we inferred that elsewhere,