AVES — AMERICAN OSTRICH. 615 



Ostriches are sometimes bred in flocks, for they are easily tamed. In this 

 domesticated state they play and frisk about with vivacity, and are tractable 

 and familiar towards those who are acquainted with them. To strangers, 

 however, they are often fierce, and will attack them with fury, making an 

 angry hissing noise, and having their throats inflated, and their mouths 

 open. During the night they frequently utter a discordant cry, which bears 

 a resemblance to the distant roaring of a lion, or the hoarse tone of a bear 

 or an ox when in great agony. 



THE TOUYOU, OR AMERICAN OSTRICH. » 



It is chiefly found in Guiana, along the banks of the Oroonoko, in the 

 inland provinces of Brazil and Chili, and the vast forests that border on the 

 mouth of the river Plata. Many other parts of South America were known 

 to have them ; but as man multiplied, these large and timorous birds either 

 fell beneath their superior power, or fled from their vicinity. It is said to be 

 found in Patagonia, and the natives are represented as chasing it on horse- 

 back, and killing it with clubs when they approach sufficiently near. 



The touyou, though not so large as the ostrich, is only second to it in 

 magnitude. It is by much the largest bird in the New Continent, and is 

 generally found to be six feet high, measuring from its head to the ground. 

 Its legs are three feet long. Its body is of an oval form, and appears entirely 

 round. It is covered from the back and rump with long feathers; these 

 feathers are gray upon the back, and white on the belly, and it has no other 

 tail. It goes very swiftly, and seems assisted in its motion by a kind of 

 tubercle behind, like a heel, upon which, on plain ground, it treads very 

 securely ; in its course it uses a very odd kind of action, lifting up one wing, 

 which it keeps elevated for a time; till letting it drop, it lifts up the other; 

 it runs with such swiftness, that the fleetest dogs are sometimes thrown out 

 in the pursuit. One of them, finding itself surrounded by the hunters, dart- 

 ed among the dogs with such fury, that they made way to avoid its rage ; 

 and it escaped, by its amazing velocity, in safety to the mountains. It de- 

 fends itself with its feet, and calls its young by a kind of hiss. 



Nieremberg relates, that, during incubation, they generally make a false 

 nest at some distance from the true one ; in this they lay two eggs, which 

 are afterwards broken by the old bird, and by attracting a number of flies, 



1 Rhea Americana, Temm. This is the only one of the genus. Its characteristics are 

 a bill straight, short, soft, depressed at the base, a little compressed at the tip, which is 

 obtuse ; lower mandible mucn depressed, flexible, and rounded at the tip ; nostrils on the 

 lateral surface of the bill, large, longitudinally cleft and open; legs long, with three toes 

 before, and a callosity behind ; wings short, with feathers more or less strong, and termi- 

 nating in a spur. 



