When thousands of flamingos in a colony are standing around the lake or by the river, where they live, it is a very grand sight from a distance. The flamingo's feathers are a bright red in color, with white or pink at the edges; so the thousands of flamingos look like an army of soldiers with red coats.
In former years, when soldiers sometimes wore red coats, travelers who happened to come toward a lake in Africa would suddenly see at a distance an army of soldiers, as they thought, standing by the lake. What they really saw were the flamingos fishing!
But no traveler could get very near the flamingos, for they have sentinels! I have told you that the wild buffaloes have sentinels to warn them when an enemy is coming. The flamingos have the same. Their sentinels stand here and there just outside the place where the others are fishing; and they keep a lookout all the time. If any enemy comes, they cry out,
"Honk! Honk! Honk!" That means, "Enemy coming! Fly away!"
And of course all the flamingos rise up in the air and fly away to a safe place, till the enemy goes away.
To see a whole flock of flamingos flying in the sky far above one's head is a most wonderful sight. You have seen a cloud at sunset shining with lovely tints of red and pink and orange: well, the flock of flamingos flying in the sky looks something like that. And they all keep level at the same great height, in rows and ranks, just like an army, as there are thousands and thousands of flamingos in the flock.
Sometimes the rows and ranks widen out for a few minutes, and fill a large portion of the sky; then they close up again, and look like one long banner of red floating in the sky.
And all the time they have sentinels that fly outside the rows and ranks. They make the pattern in the sky still more beautiful.
My dear children, the more you think of these wonders of the jungle and of the world, the more you will understand how great and wise is God, Who made all these things.