AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY. 293 



of their northern congeners travel semi-annually more than eight 

 thousand miles. These speculations lead Dr. Hudson to believe that 

 the southern brigades wing their way to the great antarctic continent to 

 rear their young, though this theory still lacks proof. However, it ex- 

 cites surprise to learn that birds of the same species are divided into 

 two companies, the one going north, the other south, and that one 

 division spends the summer 'in the same locality that the other spends 

 the winter. Our author does not tell us whether they ever meet on the 

 pampas or not. 



The pampas are richer in water and shore birds than in any other 

 kind. This is because they are the meeting place of many 

 migrants both from the north and the south. There are about 

 eighteen species of the order including storks, ibises, herons, 

 spoonbills and flamingoes; twenty species of ducks, geese and 

 swans; ten or twelve of the rails, and about twenty-five of the snipe and 

 plover group. Of land birds there is not so rich a variety, on account 

 of the scarcity of food on the pampas and the absence of timber. Still, 

 there are some very interesting species both of terrestrial aquatic birds 

 several of the most striking of which deserve notice here. 



Among them is the majestic rhea, the South American ostrich, 

 which while being rapidly exterminated, still "survives from a time 

 when there were also giants among the avians." Long and strong of 

 limb, it is very fleet, giving the hunter on horseback a hard race over 

 the grassy plains. Its expertness in dodging and twisting often 

 enables it to elude the rider and his bolas or lariat. Of a pale, bluish- 

 grav color that assimilates to the haze, it is rendered invisible even at 

 a moderate distance, When running swiftly, it possesses the unique 

 habit of keeping one wing raised vertically, though why it does this is 

 uot known, unless it helps the creature to steer its course. With the 

 natives of the pampas no greater sport could be found than rhea-hunt- 

 ing with the bolas and a swift horse trained to follow the bird in all its 

 quick dartings and doublings. This sport is known as the "wild mirth 

 of the desert." 



When taken young, the rhea, is easily domesticated, becomming as 

 tame as the common fowls of the farmyard. Our naturalist once kept 

 a brood of young rheas, which he captured soon afterthey broke from 

 the shell. While they soon learned to provide for their own wants so 

 far as food was concerned, catching flies, grasshoppers, and other in- 

 insects with surprising dexterity, they would follow their human master 

 about as if they took him for their parent. They were utterly uncon- 

 scious of the dangers surrounding them, and yet, strange to say, they 

 were not destitute of the feeling of fear; for when their keeper imitated 



