The Great Bustard 261 
in continuous fighting, the corn-growth is already quite tall, and in the 
early mornings all vegetation is saturated with night-dews, it occasionally 
happens that a bustard may be met with incapable by this cause of 
taking wing—that is, that some of the flight-feathers are lost or broken 
and all dew-soaked (roviadas). The bustard moults gradually and never 
loses the power of flight. 
While never attaining the size of wild birds, yet bustards 
thrive well in captivity—always assuming that they have been 
caught young. Old birds brought home wounded never survive 
twenty-four hours, dying not from the wound (which may be 
insignificant) but from barinchin, which may be translated 
chagrin or a broken heart. Young bustards reared thus become 
TAIL-FEATHERS OF GREAT BUSTARD 
extremely tame, coming to call and feeding from the hand, 
though when old the males are apt to grow vicious in spring, 
attacking savagely children, dogs, and even women, especially 
those whom they see to be afraid.’ Tame as they are, they are 
always subject to strange alarms, seemingly causeless. Suddenly 
they raise their wings, draw in their heads, and dance around, 
jumping in air, and ever intently regarding the heavens— 
sometimes dashing off under cover of bushes. One may connect 
this exhibition with some speck in the sky, some passing eagle, 
more often no motive is discernible. Bustard-chicks emit a 
plaintive whistle so precisely similar to that of the kites that 
(when hatched out under a domestic hen) the foster-mother has 
been so terrified as to desert her brood. When adult, bustards 
are usually quite silent, save for a grunting noise in spring—that 
is, in captivity. But on a hot day we have heard the old males, 
1 We have never succeeded in inducing our tame bustards to breed in captivity. 
