562 THE LITTLE BUSTARD. 



The Little Bustard. 



Otis Tetrax. (Linn.) 



" Our doubts are traitors, 

 And make us lose the good we oft might win 

 By fearing to attempt." — Measure for Measure. 



" When our actions do not, our fears do make us traitors." — Macbeth. 



This is one of our rarest British birds, never to my knowledge 

 seen alive about St Andrews, so I need not dwell upon it. It 

 is not half the size of the last, and much less difference between 

 the size of male and female. Its habits are similar, and lays on the 

 ground from three to five shining grass-green eggs, without spot or 

 stain. It is common on the flat, arid plains of the south of Europe, 

 and plentiful on the coasts of Barbary. Like the last, it both flies 

 and runs with great speed. Its flesh is excellent, surpassing 

 in flavour most of our gallinaceous game. It is 17J inches long 

 by 341 Its general colour on the upper parts is buff-orange 

 and black, richly barred and mottled, greater wing coverts, 

 white, with two black bars ; under parts, white ; iris, yellow. 

 Although there is nothing great and nothing small with God or 

 Nature, I here finish my history of our "Land Birds" with the 

 " great'* and " little" bustard. If the little bustard could have 

 written like little Pope, the poet, it might have said that 

 greatness or littleness like 



" Honour and shame from no conditions rise ; 

 Act well your part — there all the honour lies." 



For, as Longfellow says — 



*' Art is long, and Time is fleeting, 



And our hearts, though stout and brave, 

 Still, like muffled drums, are beating 

 Funeral marches to the grave." 



Yet Shakespeare, who seldom exaggerates, of Truth and Nature 

 says— 



"Sleep is the great restorer, the great physician." 



'* Great Nature's second course, chief nourisher in life's feast." 



As I began this unassuming work with Humboldt, saying " the 

 world was governed by universal laic, not by a God," I finish with 



