438 CLASS AVES, 



while living, than those which have been taken after death. 

 The first are recognized by the sanguinolent juice which pro- 

 ceeds from the tube when pressed between the fingers ; the 

 others are light, dry, and subject to be attacked by worms. 



The Nandu has been sometimes called the ostrich of Ma- 

 gellan, also the Chetique, Chroni, &c. Although our author 

 confines himself, like Linnaeus, to giving it the specific deno- 

 mination of Struthio Rhea, yet he admits that the presence 

 of three toes may constitute a character sufficient to form it 

 into a separate genus. As for the other characters, their dif- 

 ferences are of no great importance. 



The only species of which this genus (if it be allowed to 

 be one) is composed, is much smaller than the African ostrich. 

 As it is only in America that this bird is found) perhaps the 

 appellation of American ostrich would be the most suitable 

 for it, if considered as a species ; but if formed into the 

 genus Nandu, the denomination of ostrich must be totally 

 abandoned. 



The bill of the nandu is short, straight, and depressed ; 

 its point is obtuse and unguiculated ; the tongue is thick and 

 short ; the nostrils on the side and middle of the upper man- 

 dible ; the feet are long and robust ; there is no tail ; the 

 wings, unfit for flight, are terminated by a spur, six lines in 

 length. 



The females are smaller than the males, and have less 

 black at the origin of the neck. 



These birds never penetrate into the woods. Open plains 

 are the only places in which they are found. They usually 

 go in pairs, and sometimes in tolerably numerous flocks, but 

 only in those countries in which they are not hunted. Wlien 

 they are pursued, they run to such a distance and so rapidly 

 that it is extremely difficult to overtake them even with the 

 best horses. The hunters, who sometimes catch them with a 

 kind of collar, formed of three stones as large as the fist, and 



