AVES RHEID^. 5 



thousand feet. The ordinary habits of the ostrich are well known. They 

 feed on vegetable matter, such as roots and grass ; but at Bahia Blanca I 

 have repeatedly seen three or four come down at low water to the exten- 

 sive mud-banks which are then dry, for the sake, as the Gauchos say, of 

 catching small fish. Although the ostrich in its habits is so shy, wary and 

 solitary, and although so fleet in its pace, it falls a prey, without much 

 difficulty to the Indian or Gaucho armed with the bolas. When several 

 horsemen appear in a semicircle, it becomes confounded, and does not 

 know which way to escape. They generally prefer running against the 

 wind ; yet at the first start they expand their wings, and like a vessel 

 make all sail. On one fine hot day I saw several ostriches enter a bed 

 of tall rushes, where they squatted concealed, till quite closely approached. 

 It is not generally known that ostriches readily take to the water. Mr. 

 King informs me that in Patagonia, at the Bay of San Bias and at Port 

 Valdes, he saw these swimming several times from island to island. 

 They ran into the water, both when driven down to a point, and likewise 

 of their own accord, when not frightened ; the distance crossed was about 

 200 yards. When swimming, very little of their bodies appear alx)ve 

 water, and their necks are extended a little forward ; their progress is 

 slow. On two occasions, I saw some ostriches swimming across the 

 Santa Cruz river, where it was about four hundred yards wide, and the 

 stream rapid. Capt. Sturt (Sturt's 'Travels,' vol. ii, p. 74), when descending 

 the Merrumbedgee, in Australia, saw two emus in the act of swimming." 

 "The inhabitants who live in the country readily distinguish, even at 

 a distance, the male bird from the female. The former is larger and 

 darker coloured, and has a larger head. The ostrich, I believe the cock, 

 emits a singular, deep-toned, hissing note. When first I heard it, stand- 

 ing in the midst of some sand-hillocks, I thought it was made by some 

 wild beast, for it is a sound that one cannot tell whence it comes, or from 

 how far distant. When we were at Bahia Blanca in the months of 

 September and October, the eggs were found in extraordinary numbers, 

 all over the country. They either lie scattered single, in which case they 

 are never hatched, and are called by the Spaniards, huachos, or they are 

 collected together into a shallow excavation, which forms the nest. Out 

 of the four nests, which I saw, three contaified twenty-two eggs each, and 

 the fourth twenty-seven. In one day's hunting on horseback sixty-four 

 eggs were found ; forty-four of these were in two nests, and the remain- 



