226 HOME LIFE ON AN OSTRICH FARM. 



ness, and eyes carefully turned in any direction but 

 towards the spot where tlie paauw squats in the grass, 

 you ride round and round him in an ever -lessening circle, 

 until you get within range. Then you jump off, make 

 a run at him, and fire. 



A smaller bustard, with beautifully- variegated plum- 

 age, is about the size of a large fowl. His Dutch name 

 of knorhaan — which may be translated " scolding cock," 

 or "growling fowl" — is very justly bestowed on him to 

 express his exceeding noisiness, and I do not think that 

 tlirouo-hout the whole leno^th and breadth of the bird 

 kinofdom there exists such another chatterer. What 

 a start he gives you sometimes when, on a brisk ride or 

 drive through the veldt, you approach his hiding-place, 

 and suddenly, before you have had time to see his 

 slender dark neck and head peering out above the low 

 bush, he springs up with a deafening clamour, as of a 

 dozen birds instead of one; and, unless silenced by a shot, 

 he continues his harsh, discordant noise, apparently 

 without once stopping for breath, until his swift wings 

 have borne him far away out of hearing. A whole 

 chorus of blackbirds, suddenly disturbed from revels 

 among ripe fruit, would be nothing in comparison with 

 him. 



The quaint, old -fashioned -looking little dikkop, 

 smallest of the bustard tribe, is, in the opinion of 

 epicures, the best of all. In the bustards the position 

 of the white and dark meat is reversed, the flesh beinof 

 dark on the breast and white on the legs. They possess 

 certain feathers which are invaluable to the makers of 

 tlies for fishing. 



