THE OSTRICH. 385 



away," says the great naturalist, "as they would likely be by 

 trituration against other hard bodies, but they had been con- 

 siderably reduced by some digestive juice, and presented all the 

 evidence of actual corrosion." 



Herbage, insects, moUusks, small reptiles, and even small mam- 

 malia are the principal food of the Wild Ostrich ; when it is in a 

 state of domesticity even young chickens are frequently devoured 

 by it. It endures hunger, and especially thirst, for many days 

 — about the most useful faculty it could possess in the arid and 

 burning deserts which it inhabits ; but it is quite a mistake to 

 suppose it never drinks, for it will travel immense distances in 

 search of water when it has suffered a long deprivation, and will 

 then drink it with evident pleasure. 



The muscular power of the Ostrich is truly surprising. If 

 matured it can carry a man on its back, and is readilj^ trained 

 to be mounted like a horse, and to bear a burden. The tyrant 

 Firmius, who reigned in Egypt in the third century, was drawn 

 about by a team of Ostriches ; even now the negroes frequently 

 use it for riding. 



When it first feels the weight of its rider, the Ostrich starts at 

 a slow trot ; it, however, soon gets more animated, and stretch- 

 ing out its wings, takes to running with such rapidity that 

 it seems scarcely to touch the ground. To the wild animals 

 which range the desert it offers a successful resistance by kick- 

 ing, the force of which is so great that a blow in the chest is 

 sufficient to cause death. M. Edouard Yerreaux states that he 

 has seen a negro killed by such a blow. 



Man succeeds in capturing the Ostrich only by stratagem. 

 The Arab, on his swiftest courser, would fail to get near it 

 if he did not by his intelligence supply the deficiency in his 

 physical powers. "The legs of an Ostrich running at full 

 speed," says Livingstone, the traveller, " can no more be seen than 

 the spokes in the wheel of a vehicle drawn at a gallop." Accord- 

 ing to the same author, the Ostrich can run about thirty miles in 

 an hour — a speed and endurance much surpassing those of the 

 swiftest horse. 



The Arabs, well acquainted with these facts, follow them for 

 a day or two at a distance, without pressing too closely, yet 



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