As he spoke he raised his gun and fired at a bird darting down a narrow rift between two rocks that looked as if they had been riven asunder.
I thought he had missed it, but Ebo ran ahead and returned directly with a most lovely kingfisher in glorious plumage.
“If we get nothing more in this island, Nat, I shall be satisfied,” said my uncle as we gazed at the lovely creature which Ebo had brought; and seeing the satisfaction in our faces he indulged in another dance.
“Yes,” continued my uncle, patting Ebo’s black shoulder, “you are a treasure, Ebo, and I see we shall be greatly in your debt. Now, Nat, we must not have a feather of that bird spoiled. I feel ready to go back on purpose to prepare it.”
It was indeed a lovely creature; but as I gazed upon its delicately beautiful tints I felt puzzled. It was of rich purple on the back, with azure-blue shoulders dashed and speckled with a lighter blue, while all the under parts were of a pure white, which seemed to throw out the rich colours of the back. But the great beauty of the specimen was its tail, which was long and had the two centre feathers continued almost without any plumes till the end, where they spread out like a couple of racket bats, making the little bird in all about a foot and a half long.
I felt as if I should never tire of gazing at the beautiful specimen, and quite understood my uncle’s feeling about wishing to make sure of it by preserving it at once.
Just then, though, a large bird flew across, at which I fired, but it was too far distant, and the shots did no more than rattle about its feathers.
“Did you see its great beak, uncle?” I said.
“Yes, Nat, a hornbill. I daresay we shall find plenty of them here. They take the places in the East of the toucans of the West. But now, Nat, there is an easy shot for you—look! Ebo is pointing to it. There, seated on that twig. Now see he darts off after a fly and is back again. No, he is off once more. We have scared him.”
But by this time I had seen the bird, and taking quick aim as it hovered and snatched at a fly of some kind, I fired and brought it down, to find that I too had got a prize in the shape of a lovely little bee-eater, with plumage rich in green and blue, brown and black, while its tail was also rendered more beautiful by the extension of its central feathers in two long thin points.