O THE CASSOWARY. 



through its gullet is performed so speedily, that 

 even the very eggs which it has swallowed whole 

 pass through it unbroken, in the same form they 

 went down. In fact, the alimentary canal of this 

 animal, as was observed above, is extremely 

 short ; and it may happen that many kinds of 

 food are indigestible in its stomach, as wheat or 

 currants are to man, when swallowed whole. 



The cassowary's eggs are of a grey ash colour, 

 inclining to green. They are not so large nor so 

 round as those of the ostrich. They are marked 

 with a number of little tubercles of a deep green, 

 and the shell is not very thick. The largest of 

 these is found to be fifteen inches round one way, 

 and about twelve the other. 



The southern parts of the most eastern Indies 

 seem to be the natural climate of the cassowary. 

 His domain, if we may so call it, begins where 

 that of the ostrich terminates. The latter has never 

 be^en found beyond the Ganges, while the casso- 

 wary is never seen nearer than the islands of Ban- 

 da, Sumatra, Java, the Molucca Islands, and the 

 corresponding parts of the continent. Yet even 

 here this animal seems not to have multiplied in 

 any considerable degree, as we find one of the 

 kings of Java making a present of one of these birds 

 to the captain of a Dutch ship, considering it as 

 a very great rarity. The ostrich, that has kept 

 in the desert and unpeopled regions of Africa, 

 is still numerous, and the unrivalled tenant of 

 its own inhospitable climate ; but the cassowary, 

 that is the inhabitant of a more peopled and 

 polished region, is growing scarcer every day. It 



