are obliged to go down that way, along the edge of the lake and so up the river-bank, partly because the direct slopes are very severe, and partly to avoid disturbing the deer, wild boars, lions and leopards which the Dey preserves entirely for himself.’
‘Would a devout Muslim eat wild boar?’ asked Stephen as they rode on.
‘Oh dear me, yes,’ said Jacob. ‘The Beni Mzab have no hesitation whatsoever in eating him: many the exquisite civet de sanglier have I eaten among them. But he must be wild, you know, wild and hairy, otherwise he would certainly be unclean. And for that matter they do not observe Ramadan, either, or...’
‘There is a Barbary falcon!’ cried Stephen.
‘Very well,’ said Jacob, not quite pleased at having his account of the Beni Mzab neglected for the sake of a bird; and not at all pleased either by the way his saddle kept pinching the inside of his thighs.
They rode for a while in silence, always going downhill, which aggravated Jacob’s discomfort. But abruptly Ibrahim stopped, and with one finger to his lips, pointed silently at two fresh round footprints on the muddy edge. He whispered into Jacob’s ear; and Jacob, leaning over to Stephen, murmured, ‘Leopard.’
And there indeed he was, the lovely spotted creature, sprawling insolently along a horizontal mossy branch: he watched them with a fine unconcern for quite a time, but when Stephen made a motion, a very cautious motion, towards his telescope, the leopard slipped off his branch on the far side without a sound, and wholly vanished.
On: and now that the slope was easier by far Jacob’s saddle hurt him less: his good humour returned, at least in part.
Yet he could still say, ‘My dear colleague, you may think me crass, but where birds, beasts and flowers are concerned all I mind about is are they dangerous, are they useful, are they good to eat.’
‘My dear colleague,’ cried Stephen, ‘I do most sincerely ask your pardon. I fear I must have been an everlasting bore.’
‘Not at all,’ said Jacob, ashamed of himself. And away on the left hand, at a distance they could not determine, a lion uttered what might be called a roar - a very deep lowing repeated four or perhaps five times before dying away - which gave the impression not indeed of menace, but of enormous power.
‘That is what I mean,’ said Jacob, after a moment’s silence. ‘I like to know about him, rather than a curious and possibly nondescript nuthatch.’
The ground was now levelling, and shortly after this they wound through a grove of high, well-grown tamarisks to the shore of the lake. And when they had pushed through the last of this screen there before them, quite close to, were countless flamingos, most of them up to their knees in the water with their long-necked heads deeply immerged, but others staring about or gossiping with a sound like geese. Those within twenty yards of the horsemen rose into the air with a most glorious show of black and above all scarlet, and flew, heads and legs stretched out, to the middle. Those that remained - the majority - carried on sieving nourishment from the Shatt. Stephen was entranced. With his glass, far over, he made out the mounds of their innumerable nests, raised mounds of mud sometimes with sitting bird, and a crowd of awkward, long-legged, pale fledglings. He also saw some crested coots and a cruising marsh-harrier - a hen bird - and a few egrets; but he was uneasily aware of having prated away interminably about his treecreeper earlier in the day, and now he said no more.
But Jacob turned a beaming face towards him and cried, ‘If that unspeakably glorious spectacle is ornithology, then I am an ornithologist. I had no idea that such splendour existed. You must tell me much, much more.’
Ibrahim asked Jacob whether the gentleman had seen the red birds; and when this was relayed, Stephen smiled at the youth, made appropriate gestures, and after some fumbling produced one of the few guineas he kept in a waistcoat pocket.
When Stephen had finished his disquisition on the anatomy of the flamingo’s bill, on the intricate processes that enabled the bird to gain its living - its very exact requirements where salinity and temperature were concerned - its apparent neglect of its offspring, herded in groups looked after and fed by the entire community - the need for much more work, for much more information, exact information - when he had finished, Ibrahim came closer and spoke to Jacob, pointing towards the head of the lake with great earnestness.
‘He says that if we do not mind making a rather muddy detour he will show you a sight that you will appreciate: he very rightly looks upon you as a creature of a finer essence.’
‘Long may he live. Let us by all means see his sight.’
Its probable nature became evident as they approached the part of the lake where it received the river, a little delta of mud and sand that retained footmarks with admirable clarity on either side: and footmarks there were in extraordinary numbers, this being so convenient a fresh-water drinking place - jackals, deer of various sizes, hyenas, leopards,
