THE VOYAGE OF THE BEAGLE 



103 



mously affirm, and there is no reason to doubt their state- 

 ment, that the male bird alone hatches the eggs, and for 

 some time afterwards accompanies the young. The cock 

 when on the nest lies very close ; I have myself almost ridden 

 over one. It is asserted that at such times they are occa- 

 sionally fierce, and even dangerous, and that they have been 

 known to attack a man on horseback, trying to kick and 

 leap on him. My informer pointed out to me an old man, 

 whom he had seen much terrified by one chasing him. I 

 observe in BurchelPs travels in South Africa, that he re- 

 marks, " Having killed a male ostrich, and the feathers being 

 dirty, it was said by the Hottentots to be a nest bird." I 

 understand that the male emu in the Zoological Gardens 

 takes charge of the nest: this habit, therefore, is common 

 to the family. 



The Gauchos unanimously affirm that several females 

 lay in one nest. I have been positively told that four or 

 five hen birds have been watched to go in the middle of the 

 day, one after the other, to the same nest. I may add, also, 

 that it is believed in Africa, that two or more females lay 

 in one nest. 18 Although this habit at first appears very 

 strange, I think the cause may be explained in a simple 

 manner. The number of eggs in the nest varies from twenty 

 to forty, and even to fifty; and according to Azara, some- 

 times to seventy or eighty. Now, although it is most prob- 

 able, from the number of eggs found in one district being 

 so extraordinarily great in proportion to the parent birds, 

 and likewise from the state of the ovarium of the hen, that 

 she may in the course of the season lay a large number, yet 

 the time required must be very long. Azara states, 14 that a 

 female in a state of domestication laid seventeen eggs, each 

 at the interval of three days one from another. If the hen 

 was obliged to hatch her own eggs, before the last was laid 

 the first probably would be addled; but if each laid a few 

 eggs at successive periods, in different nests, and several 

 hens, as is stated to be the case, combined together, then 

 the eggs in one collection would be nearly of the same age. 

 If the number of eggs in one of these nests is, as I believe, 

 not greater on an average than the number laid by one 



23 Burchell's Travels, vol. i. p. 280. 14 Azara, vol. iy. p. 173. 



