to have left for their breeding-grounds. A small terrier
dog in our possession also played havoc with the ants,
which it not only caught, but eat in large numbers.
After a fortnight’s intermittent rain, the weather
became sufficiently favourable, or rather the roads were
once more passable, for another visit to my Kafirs at the
Bark farm. A new world of animal life now met the
view as I drove along the roads, which in many places
were composed of marshy mud, where on my last visit
I raised clouds of dust. In Coleóptera giant Anthias
{Anthia thoradca and A. maxillosa) were seen foraging
about, and the huge Manticora tuberculata was very
abundant, whilst Polyhirma macilenta ran about the
roads where the surface was sandy and gritty. In this
way I frequently stopped and obtained some fine
species. In the wooded tracts I found Cetonias on the
wing, many adhering to the leaves of trees, and one
(Diplognatha hebrcea) even on the long stalks of last
season’s dried but now damp grasses. In the wet but
scant herbage Blue Cranes (Anthropoid.es paradisea),
usually in pairs, searched for the orthopterous insects
which now almost daily became more plentiful, whilst
the Widow-bird [Chera progne) had now, again developed
its long tail-feathers for the breeding-season, and
frequented the long sedgy grasses that grew on the
marshy portions of the veld. These long tail-feathers
appear to offer a direct hindrance to flight, and the
birds always seemed to proceed with difficulty and great
encumbrance, like a Court Lady dragging a heavy
train.
Nature frequently reminds mankind of her forces, and
she did so with these heavy rains: small spruits became
torrents, and insignificant rivers raging floods. As usual,
accounts slowly came into Pretoria—for it is the press
which allows civilized man to rise above tradition and
hearsay, and newspapers give to prosaic life the romance
of current history. The “ Six-mile Spruit,” a stream
through which the coaches drive, and at a distance from
Pretoria which its name specifies, came down with a
suddenness that has made it famous among the streams