Save for this squarking of the parrots the swamps are silent all the
day, at least during the dry season; in the wet season there is no
silence night or day in West Africa, but that roar of the descending
deluge of rain that is more monotonous and more gloomy than any
silence can be. In the morning you do not hear the long, low,
mellow whistle of the plantain-eaters calling up the dawn, nor in
the evening the clock-bird nor the Handel-Festival-sized choruses of
frogs, or the crickets, that carry on their vesper controversy of
"she did" - "she didn't" so fiercely on hard land.
But the mangrove-swamp follows the general rule for West Africa, and
night in it is noisier than the day. After dark it is full of
noises; grunts from I know not what, splashes from jumping fish, the
peculiar whirr of rushing crabs, and quaint creaking and groaning
sounds from the trees; and - above all in eeriness - the strange whine
and sighing cough of crocodiles.
Great regions of mangrove-swamps are a characteristic feature of the
West African Coast. The first of these lies north of Sierra Leone;
then they occur, but of smaller dimensions - just fringes of river-
outfalls - until you get to Lagos, when you strike the greatest of
them all:
