102 HOME LIFE ON AN OSTRICH FARM. 



Thus, in weariness and indifference, I viewed an 

 ostrich farm for the first time. Could I but have had 

 one vision of the happy home, situated among just such 

 surroundings, which awaited me in the future, with what 

 different eyes would I have looked on all the minutest 

 details of a daily life destined one day to be mine ! 

 How eagerly would I have bribed the custodian of the 

 incubators fbr just one peep at the little rough-coated 

 baby ostriches, if I had known what numbers of these 

 comical wee things were in future to be my carefully- 

 tended nurslings ! And when T -, anxious to com- 

 pare notes, sometimes asks me how this or that was 

 managed on the Khedive's farm, and I am unable to 

 give accurate information, I still regret that lost oppor- 

 tunity ; and blush at the remembrance of the base 

 longing for luncheon, to which, I fear, the want of 

 observation was chiefly due. 



It is rather surprising to find how little is known in 

 England about ostrich-farming. Any information on 

 the subject seems quite new to the hearers ; and the 

 strangest questions are sometimes asked — as, for in- 

 stance, whether ostriches fly; whether they bite; whether 

 we ever ride or drive them, etc. It is always taken 

 for granted that a vicious bird administers his kick 

 backwards, like a horse; and there seems still to be 

 a very general belief in those old popular errors of which 

 the natural history of these creatures possesses more 

 than the average share. If you look at the picture of 

 an ostrich, you will be sure to find, in nine cases out of 

 ten, that the drawing is ludicrously incorrect ; the bird 



