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Updated: June 5, 2025
Not the particular one which exclusively forms their repast, but of ostriches in general, and more especially those of South America commonly called rheas; though to the gauchos better known by the name avestruz. Both the boys are pretty well acquainted with these birds and their habits; Cypriano having several times taken part in their chase; while Ludwig best knows them in a scientific sense.
I looked round and observed eight or ten huge ostriches stalking towards me with slow funereal gait. I felt somewhat uneasy, for their youth, of which Hobson had assured me, was in no way indicated by their huge bodies and dreadful legs. However, I had taken the precaution to carry my forked stick, and drawing it nearer continued at my work with an easier mind.
Yet it was hard to imagine how I could have started a flirtation and carried it on to its culminatory point in that great public room, with all those eyes on me; dogs, babes, and cats tumbling about my feet; ostriches staring covetously at my buttons with great vacant eyes; and that intolerable paroquet perpetually reciting "How the waters came down at Lodore," in its own shrieky, beaky, birdy, hurdy-gurdy, parrot language.
It appeared, also, that rather more than two years previously a party of Kukuana hunters had descended this path into the desert in search of ostriches, whose plumes are much prized among them for war head-dresses, and that in the course of their hunt they had been led far from the mountains and were much troubled by thirst.
"Ostriches never fly, barn door fowls fly heavily, close to the ground, and but seldom; eagles, doves, and swallows fly often, swiftly and high. Thus sinners never fly to God, but keep to the ground, nor so much as look up to Him.
The farm was about 170 acres in extent, and at this time there were about 100 ostriches upon it, a number having recently been sent away north to Port Augusta, where is another farm belonging to the same Company. Some of the birds had committed suicide on their way to the sea.
I don't feel sure of him. Perhaps it would be better " "Oh! never mind that," interrupted Squib; "we're not afraid of ostriches. Come along." "Very well," returned the host, "come along." And along they went to the domain of Gouws, who was found pacing solemnly inside the wall of his enclosure. His wings were active, and his tail was cocked. Otherwise he was calm enough to all appearance.
She is not like other mother-birds, that sit upon the eggs to keep them warm; but she leaves them in the hot sand, and the sun keeps them warm, and by and by the little ostriches will begin to chip the shell, and creep out into the great world. The ostrich eggs are good to eat. You eat your one egg for breakfast, but one of these big eggs will make breakfast for the whole family.
No one demands it, but we set ourselves to build a great dam in red sand beyond the graves. In the grey dawn before the sheep are let out we work at it. All day, while the young ostriches we tend feed about us, we work on through the fiercest heat. The people wonder what new spirit has seized us now. They do not know we are working for life.
Dobrizhoffer long ago was aware of there being two kinds of ostriches, he says, "You must know, moreover, that Emus differ in size and habits in different tracts of land; for those that inhabit the plains of Buenos Ayres and Tucuman are larger, and have black, white and grey feathers; those near to the Strait of Magellan are smaller and more beautiful, for their white feathers are tipped with black at the extremity, and their black ones in like manner terminate in white."
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