INCUBATION 45 



hatching comes from the size of the egg. The chick 

 is formed wholly from the substances contained in 

 the egg; the larger the egg in proportion to the size 

 of the animal, the stronger and more developed the 

 young. Therefore the kind with the largest eggs 

 are clothed at the time of hatching; they can run and 

 know how to eat, unaided. Where the eggs are rela- 

 tively small the young are hatched weak, naked, 

 blind, and for a long time, motionless in their nest, 

 demand the mother 's beakf ul of food. 



"The largest egg known is that of an enormous 

 bird that formerly lived in the island of Madagascar, 

 and of which the species appears to-day to have been 

 completely destroyed. This bird is called the epy- 

 ornis. It was three or four meters tall and thus 

 rivaled in stature a very long-legged horse or, better 

 still, the animal called a giraffe. Such birds ought 

 to lay monstrous eggs; such in fact they are; their 

 length is three decimeters and a half and their ca- 

 pacity nearly nine liters." 



"Nine liters !" exclaimed Emile. "Oh, what an 

 egg! Our large vinegar jug only holds ten liters. 

 Certainly the young that come from that ought to 

 know how to run and to eat." 



' ' To equal in bulk the egg of the epyornis it would 

 take one hundred and forty-eight hen's eggs." 



"I think they could make a famous omelet with 

 only one of those eggs. ' ' 



"A fine large one could be made, too, with an os- 

 trich-egg, which in size represents nearly two dozen 



