AND AMERICAN RURAL SPORTS. 



75 



carnivora, even when mo?t perfectly tamed, retain charac- 

 ters peculiar to themselves, which can never be eradicated ; 

 the cat, although caressed and fondled, seldom or ever for- 

 gets the marked propensities of her race, whilst the dog, 

 though infinitely more powerful, loses its natural peculia- 

 rities to assume those of his master. Instinct appears to 

 militate, in the strongest manner, against education, whilst 

 those animals possessing more of that faculty approaching 

 to human reason, are capable of acquiring habits and man- 

 ners wholly at variance with their natural character. 



THE OSTRICH. 



Unequalled in stature among birds, strikingly peculiar 

 in its form, singular in its habits, and eagerly sought after 

 as furnishing in his graceful plumes one of the most elegant 

 among the countless vanities both of savage and civilized 

 life, the Ostrich has always excited a high degree of inte- 

 rest in the minds even of the most superficial observers. 

 But far more strongly does this feeling prevail in that of 

 the reflecting naturalist, who does not regard this gigantic 

 bird as an isolated portion of the great system of nature, 

 but perceives in it one of those remarkable links in the 

 complicated chain of the creation, too often invisible to 

 human scrutiny, but occasionally too obvious to be over- 

 looked, which connect together the various classes of ani- 

 mated beings. With the outward form and the most essen- 

 tial parts of the internal structure of Birds, it combines in 

 many of its organs so close a resemblance to the Rumina- 

 tin"" Quadrupeds, as to have received, from the earliest 

 antiquity, an epithet indicative of that aflSnity which later 

 investigations have only tended more satisfactorily to esta- 

 blish. The name of Camel-Bird, by which it was known, 

 not only to the Greeks and Romans, but also to the nations 

 of the East ; the broad assertion of Aristotle, that the 

 Ostrich was partly Bird and partly Quadruped; and that of 

 Pliny, that it might almost be said to belong to the Class 

 of Beasts; are but so many proofs of the popular recognition 

 of a well authenticated zoological fact 



The Ostrich, in fact, is altogether destitute of the power 

 of flight, its wings being reduced to so low a degree of 

 development as to be quite incapable of sustaining its 

 enormous bulk in the air. Its breast-bone is consequently 

 flattened and uniform on its outer surface, like that of a 

 Quadruped, offering no trace of the elevated central ridge 

 so generally characteristic of Birds, and so conspicuously 

 prominent in those which possess the faculty of supporting 

 themselves long upon the wing. Its legs, on the contrary, 

 are excessively powerful; and are put in action by muscles 



of extraordinary magnitude. This muscular power, toge- 

 ther with the great length of its limbs, enables it to run 

 with incredible swiftness, and to distance, with little exer- 

 tion, the fleetest Arabian horses. The total want of 

 feathers on every part of these members, and their division 

 into no more than two toes, connected at the base by a 

 membrane, a structure not unaptly compared to the elon- 

 gated and divided hoof of the Camel, have alwa)'S been 

 considered striking points of resemblance between these 

 animals: but there is another singularity in their external 

 conformation which aSbrds a still more remarkable coin- 

 cidence. They are both furnished with callous protube- 

 rances on the chest, and on the posterior part of the 

 abdomen, on which they support themselves when at rest; 

 and they both lie down in the same manner, by first 

 bending the knees, and then applying the anterior callosity, 

 and lastly, the posterior, to the ground. Add to this that, 

 equally patient of thirst, and endowed with stomachs some- 

 what similar in structure, they are both formed for inha- 

 biting, to a certain extent, the same arid deserts, and it 

 will readily be granted, that the affinity between these 

 animals is not so fanciful as might, at first sight, be ima- 

 gined. 



The family of Birds, of which the Ostrich forms the 

 leading type, is remarkable for the wide dispersion of its 

 several members; each of them vindicating, as it were, to 

 itself, a distinct portion of the surface of the earth. The 

 Ostrich, which is spread over nearly the whole of Africa, 

 is scarcely known beyond the limits of the Arabian deserts; 

 while the Cassowary occupies its place amid the luxuriant 

 vegetation of the Indian Archipelago. The Emeu is con- 

 fined to the great Australian Continent, and the Rhea to 

 the southern extremity of the Western Hemisphere. And 

 finally, returning homewards, we find the Bustard, the 

 largest bird of this quarter of the globe, receding, it is 

 true, in some particulars, from the typical form, but still 

 fairly to be regarded as the representative of the family in 

 Europe. Some species, however, belong to the same group 

 with this latter bird, extend themselves over a considerable 

 portion both of Africa and Asia. 



The principal external characters by which the birds 

 above enumerated are connected together, consist in the 

 absence of the hind-toe, of which not even a vestige re- 

 main; in the length and power of their legs, which are 

 completely bare of feathers; in the shortness of their wings, 

 and their uselessness as organs of flight; in the length of 

 their necks; and in their strong, blunt, flattened bills. The 

 plumes of the more typical among them are distinguished 

 by the want of cohesion between their barbs, a cohesion 

 which, in other birds, is manifestly subservient to the 

 purposes of flight, and which would, therefore, have been 



