THE OSTRICH 15 



of feathers suddenly fallen off. The Ostriches were so 

 astonished at this extraordinary sight — a scarecrow bird 

 first of all shooting arrows at them, and then coming to 

 pieces before their very eyes — that they could do nothing 

 but stare at him and walk round him, waiting for the 

 next thing to happen. But meantime the three horsemen 

 had ridden up, and the unlucky Hottentot was rescued, 

 well-nigh crazy with terror. 



The veteran big-game hunter, Gordon Gumming, paid 

 for rashly coming near a wounded and dying Ostrich. It 

 was the first he had " bagged," and a very fine male bird. 

 Badly injured though it was and lamed, it "lashed 

 out," he tells us, "and caught me a severe blow on my 

 leg, laying me prostrate. . . . The power possessed by 

 an Ostrich," he adds, " can hardly be imagined ; the thigh 

 is very muscular, and resembles that of a horse more 

 than of a bird." 



This same hunter mentions having seen an Ostrich use 

 the stratagem which so many smaller birds employ, of 

 luring the intruder away from the nest by shamming 

 injury. " I fell in," he says, " with a troop of twelve young 

 Ostriches, not much larger than guinea-fowl. I was 

 amused to see the mother try to lead us away, exactly 

 like a wild duck, spreading out and drooping her wings, 

 and throwing herself down on the ground before us as 

 if wounded, while the cock bird cunningly led the brood 

 away in an opposite direction." 



In their wild state, in South Africa, Ostriches are 

 constantly seen mixed up with herds of gnus or wilde- 

 beestes, zebras, giraffes, and other roving animals, with 

 which they travel about on the vast plains. It seems 

 a strange comradeship, but they have one thing in 

 common— fleetness of foot. If danger threatened, as often 



