644 THE OSTRICH. 



them with a running noose or little lasso, made of the stem of an ostrich's feather, fastened 



to the end by a long stick. A boy on a quiet old horse will frequently thus catch thirty 

 or forty in a day." 



The food of the Tinamous consists mostly of grain ; and after the fields of corn and 

 maize are sown, these birds do considerable damage by running over the ground, and 

 picking out all the seeds which have not been entirely covered by the soil. The eggs of 

 these birds are about seven or eight in number, and are laid in the centre of some 

 convenient tuft of herbage. 



The Elegant Tinaniou is a native of Chili, and is rather larger than the generality of 

 its kind, as it slightly exceeds a grouse in dimensions, and has a much longer neck. The 

 head and neck are light greyish buff with short delicate longitudinal streaks, and upon the 

 head there is a long curved crest, each feather being brown with a dark streak along its 

 centre. The back is spotted and barred with buff and blackish brown, and on the breast 

 and general under-surface the feathers are irregularly barred with the same hue, the bars 

 being wider and darker on the flanks. 



CURSORES. 



With the Ostkich commences a most important group of bird.s, containing the largest 

 and most powerful members of the feathered tribe, and termed Cursores, or Eunning- 

 Birds, on account of their great speed of foot and total impotence of wing. All the 

 birds belonging to this order have the legs developed to an extraordinary degree, the 

 bones being long, stout, and nearly as solid as those of a horse, and almost devoid of the 

 air-cells which give such lightness to the bones of most buxls. By the aid of the micro- 

 scope, the peculiar character of the bone is clearly shown, though the bone of an Ostrich 

 or cassowary is very different from the same bone in a fowl or a pigeon. The -^^dngs are 

 almost wanting externally, their bones, although retaining the same number and form as 

 in ordinary birds, being veiy small, as if suddenly checked in their growth. The huge 

 wing muscles which give such prominence to the breast of flying birds, are therefore not 

 required, and the breast-bone is consequently devoid of the projecting keel, and is quite 

 smooth and rounded. 



The common Ostrich is so well known that little need be said of its habits, its use to 

 mankind, and the mode of hunting it, a very brief description being all that is necessaiy. 



This magnificent creature, the largest of all existing birds, inhabits the hot sandy 

 deserts of Africa, for which mode of life it is wonderfully fitted. In height it measures 

 from six to eight feet, the males being larger than their mates, and of a blacker tint. 

 The food of the Ostrich consists mostly of the wild melons which are so beneficently 

 scattered over the sandy wastes, absorbing and retaining every drop of moisture condensed 

 in the comparatively cool temperature of night, or fallen in the brief but severe rainstorms 

 which serve to give new vigour to the scanty desert vegetation and to replenish the rare 

 water springs. 



Besides these melons, which tlie Ostrich, in common with the lion and other inhabitants 

 of the desert, eats as much for drinlc as for food, the bird feeds on grasses and hard grain, 

 which it is able to crush in its powerful gizzard, the action of which internal mill is 

 aided by stones and other hard substances, which the Ostrich picks up and swallows just 

 as ordinary grain-eating birds swallow sand and small pebbles. In captivity the Ostrich 

 wUl swallow almost anything that comes in its way, such as brickbats, knives, old slioes, 

 scraps of wood, feathers, and tenpenny nails, ui addition to the legitimate stones. It has 

 even been seen to swallow in succession a brood of ducklings ; but whether in that casa 

 the bird was impelled by normal hunger, whether it was afflicted by a morbid appetite, or 

 whether it was merely eating the young birds for sheer mischief, are questions open for 

 consideration. 



The Ostrich is a gregarious bird, associating in flocks, and being frequently found 

 mixed up with the vast herds of quaggas, zebras, giraffes, and antelopes which inhabit the 



