Show Coral Reefs Flamingos Cited for Great Beauty There are on this earth a few things so exquisitely beautiful that thatto thatto thatto to believe in them one must see them writes Gilbert C. C Klingel in inthe inthe inthe the Baltimore Sun One is the un un- unearthly unearthly un- un unearthly earthly fairyland of a coral reef seen from undersea Another is the flamingo I shall never forget my first view of these flaming scarlet creatures It happened in 1929 when I was ship ship- shipwrecked shipwrecked shipwrecked wrecked on the island of British West Indies Our ship had been ground to pieces on a coral reef and we had waded ashore through the surf our clothes soaked and in tatters ourselves weary to exhaustion Almost in mockery the setting sun was tinting the world with refulgent gold From high above came a faint honking such honking such plaintive mournful notes as the wild geese sing on the north wind We looked up and saw that from the interior of the island was coming a great flock of scarlet flamingo wings ablaze in the sun sun- light Like geese they were flying too in V-shaped V formation hundreds of them guided by a leader The scarlet of their wings flashed and flared set in vivid contrast by the velvety black of the wing tips |