NATURAL HISTORY. 
9'9 
enough to buoy it from the furface of the 
earth ; but with their alliflance, added to 
the length of its legs, it exceeds in fpeed the 
fwifteft Arabian. It has legs and thighs like 
a heron, and each foot has three claws co- 
vered with horn, the elaftic ftrength of which 
greatly facilitate and increafes its flight. 
Its eggs are fo large, that they commonly 
weigh fifteen pounds. That they difregan.! 
their future progeny, Kolben denies, having 
feen them fet on their eggs at the Cape of 
Good Hope. She, however, deferts them 
by day ; but like other birds, returns to them 
at night. The climate at the Cape requiring 
her brooding heat, it is a natural inftinft; but, 
in thofe parts of Africa, nearer the equator, 
we eonceivethey do, as reported, leave their 
eggs to be hatched by the fun, but not with- 
out the precaution of covering them with 
faiul, and bringing worms and other provifi- 
ons for the young, when hatched ; for, in 
birds, as in other creatures, nature conforms 
to the foil and climate which they arc to in- 
habit. The limplicity and ignorance of the 
oflrich is particularly obfcrvable, in its only 
hiding its head to fecurc its body from the at- 
tack of the hunters. 
The amazing power poflefled by this bird, 
of digefting Hones, iron, and other crude, ii^b- 
ftances, evinces the wifdom of the Creator', in 
giving it the faculty of turning to nutriment 
thofe thingswhich itsbarrenand nativedeferts 
only afford. 
The 
