SHORT-WINGED CURSORIAL BIRDS. 2gT 



marked with pale yellow. According to Hardy the weight of one fully equals that of twenty-four of 

 the eggs laid by the Domestic Fowl. To travellers in the African deserts these huge eggs form a 

 convenient and portable provision ; their flavour is excellent, and the shell so thick that they keep 

 perfectly fresh for a fortnight or three weeks. Tristram mentions having found Ostrich egg omelette a 

 most valuable addition to his desert bill of fare. When two months old the young acquire a plumage 

 similar to that of the adult female ; this is retained by both sexes for two years, when the male 

 exhibits black feathers and has attained his full size and strength. The young Ostrich is easily 

 domesticated, and is often kept by the Arabs, living freely with the goats and camels, and showing no 

 disposition to escape. In some villages they are a sort of public property and live in the bazaars, 

 levying contributions for themselves from the fruit-stalls. 



The Romans highly esteemed the flesh of the Ostrich, and the pseudo-Emperor Firmius is said 

 to have devoured an entire bird at one meal ; the brain was regarded as a choice delicacy, and 

 to provide the Emperor Heliogabalus with a sufficient supper of this luxurious diet, six hund-ed 

 Ostriches, we are told, lost their lives. They were also introduced into the Circus, and upon one 

 occasion no less than one thousand of them, together with a number of other animals, fell victims 

 to the cruel thirst for excitement that debased the populace of Rome. In all parts of Southern and 

 Central Africa, the flesh, feathers, and eggs of the Ostrich are highly esteemed, and form most valuable 

 articles of traffic. A skin is in sorfte parts worth from forty to one hundred dollars, but the Arabs are 

 in the habit of thinning the feathers so that the trader rarely obtains a specimen on which this tax has 

 not been levied. Anderson describes a foot chase of these birds, witnessed by himself, on the banks 

 of Lake Ngami. On this occasion the flock was entirely surrounded, and the terrified birds driven 

 with loud cries and a variety of strange noises into the water. Moffat also gives an amusing account 

 of another mode adopted by the Bushmen for their destruction. A skin is stuffed with straw so as to 

 form a kind of saddle, and covered with feathers ; this is placed upon a man's head, his legs are 

 painted white, and with the head and neck of an Ostrich mounted upon a stick in one hand and his 

 gun in the other, he steals amidst an unsuspecting party, and by imitating their gestures so completely 

 deceives them as to his identity, that they make no attempt to avoid the treacherous intruder. 

 Amongst the many ways employed to cook Ostrich eggs, Burchell mentions that the Hottentots 

 prepare them by boring a small hole at one end ; into this they insert a thin twig and stir the contents 

 briskly over a fire of hot ashes ; when thus prepared they are excellent. 



The NANDUS {Rhea), as the American representatives of the Ostrich are called, closely resemble 

 their African brothers in general formation, but have a somewhat shorter wing, and the foot fiirnished 

 with three toes. The bill is flat, of the same length as the head, broad at its base, and rounded at its 

 tip, and very similar to that of the Ostrich. The toes are moderately long, connected by a skin at 

 their base, and armed with straight sharp claws, which are compressed at their sides, bluntly rounded 

 at their upper surface, and sharply ridged beneath. The wings are furnished with long plumes and 

 terminated by a spur ; the tail-feathers are entirely wanting. The region of the eye, cheek-stripes, and 

 a ring covered with bristles that encircles the ear, are unfcathered and covered with a wrinkled skin ; 

 the feathers on the head and throat are small, narrow, and pointed ; those on the rump are large, 

 broad, and rounded with a soft flowing web ; the eyelids are furnished with large stift" bristles. The 

 male and female are almost alike in colour, but difter in size. We are now acquainted with three 

 members of the above group. 



THE TRUE NANDU, OR AMERICAN OSTRICH. 

 The True Nandu, or American Ostrich (_R/u:a Awen'uvm), has the plumage ou the crown 



