Natural History 399 



The Ostrich Tribe 



Among the birds of the present day, the Ostrich tribe and 

 the Penguins are the principal examples of flightlessness. The 

 Ostrich and its kin are for the most part birds of large size, pos- 

 sessing a soft, hair-like plumage, diminutive wings, and strong 

 legs; they are capable of running at great speed across open 

 country, and also of kicking with suddenness and force. Their 

 breastbones lack the pronounced "keel" which is so noticeable in 

 most birds, and which serves for the attachment of the great 

 muscles for working the wings in flight. Best known, of course, 

 is the African Ostrich, now being domesticated by man for the 

 sake of its plumes, but there are also several kinds of American 

 Ostriches or Rheas in South America, and of Cassowaries and 

 Emus in Australasia. Unlike their fellows are the Kiwis of New 

 Zealand, birds of no great size, timid and nocturnal in habit; 

 their long beaks and their hair-like plumage combine to give 

 an exceedingly quaint appearance, and there are no visible 

 wings. 



Penguins 



The Penguins are rather a different case, for their wings have 

 by no means fallen into disuse ; they have become, instead, adapted 

 for swimming. There are many different kinds, but all belong to 

 the Southern Hemisphere, and most of them to the far south. 

 Many Antartic explorers have brought back tales of their life, 

 but it is to Dr. Murray Levick, who was with the Terra Nova 

 in 1910, that we owe one of the best accounts, relating particu- 

 larly to the Adelie Penguin. These flightless birds will return, 

 "over hundreds of miles of trackless sea," to the same "rookeries" 

 year after year to breed. Dr. Levick describes how the first 

 penguin arrived at the "rookery" at Cape Adare towards the 

 middle of October, the southern spring, and how four days later 

 the birds were coming in across the still unbroken sea-ice in such 

 numbers that they formed a line stretching northwards as far as 



