Afterwards he thought it queer that he should have seen them so clearly.

He remembered especially seeing pelicans, with their preposterous, pendant throats.

He wondered why the pelican was the symbol of charity, except it was that it wanted a good deal of charity to admire a pelican.

He remembered a hornbill, which was simply a huge yellow beak with a small bird tied on behind it.

The whole gave him a sensation, the vividness of which he could not explain, that Nature was always making quite mysterious jokes.