In these dismal woods, which are interspersed with patches of high reeds, with dense brambles and underwood in the dryer places, the water is often up to one's waist. Many sorts of wildfowl literally swarm, and attract a corresponding number of birds of prey. Vultures, eagles, falcons, buzzards, harriers and owls were so numerous that in the evening nearly every tree was tenanted by some great bird which had come from the surrounding swamp to roost. Among these, spotted and white-tailed eagles were most common; and the latter were all breeding in the month of February. Some pairs, indeed, must have commenced nidification as early as Christmas; for a nest was found on February 17th, containing two young ones at least a week old. The nests were usually placed on large willows or poplars, and from these eyries we obtained a view which seldom gladdens the eye of a naturalist. Here and there one could see small parties of cranes stalking about amongst the bog-myrtle bushes, great white herons in snowy grandeur wading solemnly in the reeds, pygmy cormorants sitting on the branches which overhung the water, flocks of little gulls hawking like swallows in the bright sunshine, ducks of a dozen species flying about in every direction, smews and grebes diving in the streams which intersect the marsh, harriers and eagles sailing over the tops of the reeds and striking occasionally at some unwary duck; while waders and warblers of many kinds frequented the outskirts of this ornithological paradise. Indeed the days that we spent at Luko Monastir, a small monastery on the edge of this morass, were among the pleasantest of our tour; and what with pheasant and duck shooting in the mornings, nesting and eagle shooting in the afternoons, and skinning in. the evenings, our time was fully occupied.[1]
Early in March we went to Constantinople, where I made the acquaintance of a French banker, M.A. Alleon, who was as fond of birds as he was of good living, and not only helped us to explore the Forest of Belgrade, which was then the breeding place of many rare birds of prey, but enabled us to taste the delicacies of Turkish cookery, which is too little known in Europe. It is a curious fact that even in out-of-the-way parts of the East you often find, among Turks, Greeks, Arabs, Hindus, Malays, and even Tibetans, men who have a natural genius for cookery, which is lacking, as a rule, in our country, and even more so in countries colonised by our countrymen. I have had a better dinner for ninepence in a Bulgarian country town than one could get for ten times the money in England, Scotland or Ireland, where meat dishes seem to be the only idea of good living among the lower and middle classes.
After a few days in Constantinople, we went on to the Crimea, where we visited the battlefields and trenches, then in very much the same state as they were left by our army, and on the battlefield of Alma I saw the ground where my regiment had gained so much distinction.
I remember one thing which may, to some extent, explain the very weak defences of the Russian left on the Alma, whose valley is bordered on that side by earth cliffs, which were easily stormed and taken by the French. As one approached from the direction whence our Army came, these cliffs appeared, owing to some optical illusion which I cannot
- ↑ Quoted from Ibis, January, 1870.
