Page:Livingstone in Africa.djvu/104

With many a fleecy cloudlet sailing slow.
Small richly armour'd quaint iguanas bask
On every sunniest bough; while startled eyes
Of glorious lithe beasts flash for a moment
Out of the solemn sylvan opaline
Of hoary forest boles, and swiftly vanish:
Little agamas nod their orange heads;
A lovely praying mantis, green as leaves,
Rests on green leaves; and green cameleons.

We wind along; the waters rise from rain;
Blue hazy hills arise, saluting us.
Often, when we have doubled some fair cape,
With thud and plash fall fragments of rich loam;
And as we round low river promontories,
Crocodiles basking upon yellow sand,
With dull green eyes, and huge obscene fang'd jaws,
Wake startled; gliding plunge into the flood;
Where many a delicate-tinted pelican
Stores silver fishes in his hanging pouch.