RHEA AMERICANA. 217 



found throughout the Argentine Republic down to the Rio Negro in 

 Patagonia, and, in decreasing numbers, and associating with Darwin's 

 Rhea, to a considerable distance south of that river. Until within very 

 recent times it was very abundant on the pampas, and I can remember 

 the time when it was common within forty miles of Buenos Ay res city. 

 But it is now becoming rare, and those who wish to have a hand in its 

 extermination must go to a distance of three or four hundred miles 

 from the Argentine capital before they can get a sight of it. 



The Rhea is peculiarly well adapted, in its size, colour, faculties, and 

 habits, to the conditions of the level woodless country it inhabits ; its 

 lofty stature, which greatly exceeded that of any of its enemies before the 

 appearance of the European mounted hunter, enables it to see far ; its 

 dim grey plumage, the colour of the haze, made it almost invisible to 

 the eye at a distance, the long neck being so slender and the bulky body 

 so nearly on a level with the tall grasses ; while its speed exceeded that 

 of all other animals inhabiting the same country. When watching the 

 chase of Ostriches in the desert pampas, abounding in giant grasses, it 

 struck me forcibly that this manner of hunting the bird on horseback 

 had brought to light a fault in the Rhea a point in which the corre- 

 spondence between the animal and its environment is net perfect. The 

 Rhea runs smoothly on the surface, and where the tall grass-tussocks 

 are bound together, as is often the case, with slender twining plants, its 

 legs occasionally get entangled, and the bird falls prostrate, and before 

 it can struggle up again the hunter is close at hand and able to throw 

 the bolas the thong and balls, which, striking the bird with great force, 

 wind about its neck, wings, and legs, and prevent its escape. When I 

 questioned Ostrich-hunters as to this point they said that it was true 

 that the Rhea often falls when running hotly pursued through long 

 grass, and that the deer ( Cervus campestris) never falls because it leaps 

 over the large tussocks and all such obstructions. This small infirmity 

 of the Rhea would not, however, have told very much against it if some 

 moderation had been observed in hunting it, or if the Argentine Govern- 

 ment had thought fit to protect it ; but in La Plata, as in North Ame- 

 rica and South Africa, the licence to kill, which every one possesses, has 

 been exercised with such zeal and fury that in a very few more years 

 this noblest Avian type of the great bird-continent will be as unknown 

 on the earth as the Moa and the ^Epyornis. 



The Rhea lives in bands of from three or four to twenty or thirty 

 individuals. Where they are not persecuted they show no fear of man, 

 and come about the houses, and are as familiar and tame as domestic 

 animals. Sometimes they become too familiar. At one estancia I 

 remember an old cock-bird that constantly came alone to feed near the 

 gate, and that had so great an animosity against the human figure in 



