The Struthionine birds are now nearly confined to the southern hemisphere, and the living forms are only the last survivors of a once numerous order, which also dominated in Europe, and probably North America, since, from the strata underlying London, several fossil remains have been described, the so-called Macrornis, said to be related to the emu, and the so-called Magalornis emuinus of similar affinities. Also from New Mexico is a fossil ostrich known, the Diatryma gigantea of Cope.
It may be interesting to quote as a conclusion Mr. Wallace's ideas as to the origin of the birds in question, and how he accounts for their present disconnected distribution.
During the early period, he contends, when the great southern continents- South America, Africa, and Australia--were equally free from the incursions of the destructive felines of the north, the Struthiones, or ostrich type of birds, was probably developed into its existing forms. It is not at all necessary to suppose that these three continents were at any time united, in order to account for the distribution of these great terrestrial birds .... The ancestral Struthious type may, like the marsupial, have once spread over the larger portion of the globe; but as higher forms, especially Carnivora, became developed, it would be exterminated everywhere but in those regions where it was flee from their attacks. In each of these it would develop into special forms adapted to surrounding conditions; and the large size, great strength, and excessive speed of the ostrich may have been a comparatively late development caused by its exposure to the attacks of enemies which rendered such modification necessary.
The ostrich - the largest, and the first to open the series of the living birds- belongs to the genus Struthio, which alone constitutes the family STRUTHIONIDAE and the super-family STRUTHIOIDEAE. A native of the plains and deserts of Africa, it has been known to civilized man since the beginning of the history of the western nations, noted for its size, its swiftness of foot, and the beauty of its cuffed tail and wing plumes, which, since time immemorial, have been used as signs of distinction and as ornament, therefore being the object of an important trade on the African continent. Huge fans of ostrich-plumes belong to the attributives of the African and Oriental rulers of to-day as they did during the time of the Egyptian Pharaohs; the ladies of olden Rome prized its unrivaled feathers, and live ostriches were among the strange animals which, nearly two thousand years ago, were exhibited to the gaze of the populace in the arenas and amphitheatres, while to-day that giant is indispensable to any menagerie or zoological garden of reputation. Hottentots and other African savages kill him for the feathers, Arabian sheiks and English tourists hunt him for sport, lions and other wild beasts kill him whenever they find an opportunity; and although the ostrich is one of the few birds deprived of the capacity of flight, yet he is not exterminated, nor is he likely to become so in a near future, for several reasons: his swiftness of foot, his great productiveness, and his recent domestication, which promises to increase the number of living ostriches by ten for each one destroyed by the repeating rifle.
The nearest allies of the true ostriches are the South American naudus, which differ from the other birds of the same order by having the wing-bones comparatively well developed, especially by a long humerus, and there being three fingers on the hand. They have also a strong ambiens muscle, which is absent in the cassowaries and emus; the gall-bladder is absent. Among them the African and the American ostriches are distinguished by the former having two toes only, the third and fourth, respectively, with four and five phalanges, the latter being clawless, thus showing a tendency to become finally reduced, as in the Solipeds among the mammals; the true ostrich, furthermore, is characterized by an external tail; by the maxillo-palatines articulating with facets on the sides of the vomer; by the pubes uniting in a ventral symphysis, while the ischia are free; by having two carotids, besides several other features.
The "camel bird," the "pride of the desert," is represented in Africa by three forms or species, the well-known Struthio camelus, besides the more recently described
Australia, from South Africa, and S. molybdophanes from Somali-land, though the status of the two last ones is yet somewhat doubtful. An ostrich is also known to occur in the deserts adjoining Palestine and the countries of the Euphrates valley, and is also said to inhabit Arabia proper. That it has always been called camelus does not prove that it is the same species as that of Western Africa, since the two other forms of that continent, until a few years ago, were confounded with it under the same name; it is rather probable that the Asiatic bird is separable. The differences, however, are slight and only visible to the expert. For our purpose it suffices to describe the appearance 0£ the ostrich in general. The head, neck, and legs are naked, only covered by a sparse down; the male has black feathers on the body, those of the wing and tail being white and of the greatest value; the female is plainer colored, brownish gray, and the young birds, when two months old, are similar; the chick is covered all over with a light-colored spiny down, with longitudinal blackish stripes. The full adult plumage is assumed at the third year. The adult male stands about seven feet high, and weighs from one hundred and fifty to two hundred pounds. In habits the different forms may be nearly identical, and what trustworthy travelers have related of one species is probable applicable to the others.
The ostrich has, from olden time, been regarded as an exceedingly stupid bird, --we all remember the tale of the ostrich believing himself concealed when putting his head behind a stone so he could not see his enemy,- and Alfred Brehm has emphatically expressed the same opinion, though other observers attribute its shyness and timidity to a certain degree of intelligence. In captivity it soon becomes tame, and is said to be quite gentle, but is easily frightened so as to run insanely about in its inclosure; during the breeding season the old male is usually quite savage, and attacks even man, inflicting sometimes dangerous injuries by kicking.
Timid and of rather solitary tastes, the ostrich lives in small flocks, relying upon their extraordinarily acute sight and their fleetness of foot for safety, often in the neighborhood of the still more wary herds of wild zebras. They feed upon the low grass and herbs, when in the wild state, and occasionally some insects, a few reptiles or the like are picked up; but it is only in confinement that the ostrich proves himself that voracious omnivorous animal that has made the ostrich stomach almost proverbial.
Judging from the scanty information of travelers as to the voice of the ostrich, we may infer that, usually, it is a rather silent bird, though occasionally making good use of its rather imperfect syrinx, as seems evident from Livingstone's statement, that it is frequently difficult to distinguish its bellowing from the roaring of the lion.
In order to illustrate certain habits, and the manner in which they are hunted in North Africa, we transcribe the following from Rev. Mr. Tristram's spirited account of his experiences in that part of the world:-
The capture of the ostrich is the greatest feat of hunting to which the Arab sportsman aspires, and in richness of booty it ranks next to the plunder of a caravan, but such prizes are not to be obtained without cost and toil, and it is generally estimated that the capture of an ostrich or two must be at the sacrifice of the lives of two horses. So wary is the bird, and so open are the vast plains over which it roams, that no ambuscades or artifices can be employed, and the vulgar resource of dogged perseverance is the only mode of pursuit. The horses to be employed undergo a long and painful training, abstinence from water and a diet of dry dates being considered the best means for strengthening their wind. The hunters set forth with small skins of water strapped under their horses' bellies, and a scanty allowance of food for four or five days, distributed judiciously about their saddles. The ostrich generally lives in companies of from four to six individuals, which do not appear to be in the habit, under ordinary circumstances, of wandering more than twenty or thirty miles from their headquarters. When descried, two or three of the hunters follow the herd at a gentle gallop, endeavoring only to keep the birds in sight, without alarming them or driving them at full speed, when they would soon be lost to view. The rest of the pursuers leisurely proceed in a direction at right angles to the course which the ostriches have taken, knowing by experience their habit of running in a circle. Posted on the best lookout they can find, they await for hours the anticipated route of the game calculating upon intersecting their path. If fortunate enough to detect them, the relay sets upon the now fatigued flock, and frequently succeeds in running one or two down, though a horse or two generally falls exhausted in the pursuit. The ostrich, when overtaken, offers no resistance beyond kicking out sideways. A skin in full plumage is worth on the spot from forty to one hundred Spanish dollars; but the Arabs are in habit of judiciously thinning the feathers, so that 'the trader can rarely obtain a specimen on which this tax has not been paid."
The chase of wild ostriches for the sake of the feathers will soon become a thing of the past, however, since now the rational domestication of this valuable bird has proved a grand success. The natives of some parts of Africa have, in fact, been practising "ostrich farming" before white men visited them, and even used artificial incubation. We are told that tribes of Sudan, the upper Senegal, and the Algerian frontiers raise their ostriches like real poultry-yard birds. By day the birds wander about the camp in search of food, and come back again at night-fall to pass the night under the shelter of their master's tents. When the tribe is traveling, they follow faithfully along without ever turning aside, and without evincing the least desire to return to a wild life. Still this ostrich raising has been quite insignificant, and only a small fraction of the plumes in the market was due to that source, and it was first when the European--particularly English--colonists in different parts of Africa commenced that remunerative business on a grand scale, that the supply of ostrich-feathers from tame birds, bred in captivity, became considerable. A few figures will show the importance of this new branch of "stock" raising, which is hardly twenty years old, since, in 1865, the English colonies owned only eighty tame ostriches. The value of the annual yield of feathers in South Africa at the present day is estimated at about four million dollars, while in 1865 the total export (wild and tame) from the Cape did not reach one-tenth of that amount. On an "ostrich farm" the industry is divided into two branches, that of producing feathers, and of raising young birds. From a recent report on the subject we make the following interesting extracts: An ostrich is first plucked at the age of six to eight months, and again six to nine months later, and every succeeding six to nine months. The chicken feathers are of little value, say about five dollars per bird, but the next and following pluckings realize from forty to one hundred and fifty dollars per bird. The length of time between each plucking, the weight of the feathers, and the richness of the plumage, depend partly upon what care is taken not to extract the feathers too early, thus causing injury to the wing,,but more especially upon the quality of the pasturage. On good grazing land, one acre is required per bird. The best mode of plucking the feathers is not to pull them out, but to cut the quill about an inch from the root, the portion left in the wing speedily "ripens," and may in a few weeks be pulled out with a pair of pincers, after which the new feather begins to form. Others advocate a specially constructed box in which the bird cannot move; through openings in the sides the wings are accessible, and, by a double movement of twisting and pulling the feathers are drawn.
The ostrich is monogamic, and the hen lays an egg every alternate day in the nest dug out in the sand by the male, if that hollow can be termed a nest. Ten eggs are probably the average number laid in the wild state, but in captivity the laying may be continued like that of the common fowl when the eggs are taken away as soon as deposited, On the "farm," the egg which the birds themselves cannot cover may be hatched artificially in an incubator, the result of which is illustrated by the following extract from Douglas's book on "Ostrich Farming in South Africa": "One set of three birds--a cock and two hens--during the period from June 30, 1872 to June 30, 1873, laid 188 eggs, which produced 133 chicks; of these 18 died, leaving 115 young birds. Of these, 74 were sold at three months old at $16 each, and allowing the remaining 41 to be worth only $12 each, we have a return of $1,676 from one set of birds. The next year the same set laid 113 eggs, producing 77 Chicks; and the first six months of the third year they laid 97 eggs, producing 81 chicks, being over 80 per cent." The eggs vary considerably in size, from 5 1 /2 inches to 6 inches long, by 4 inches thick, averaging about the weight of 24 eggs of our common fowl. They are incubated by both parents alternately, the male sitting during the night. In the hottest countries they are left during part of the day, but are then usually covered up with sand. An interesting account of the finding of the nest is rendered by Rev. Tristram.
"Once, and once only, had I the good fortune to take an ostrich's nest. We had observed with our telescopes two birds standing for some time in one spot, and were induced to ride towards them. By great good fortune we detected their track as we crossed it; for, the stride of the ostrich often measuring, when at full speed, from 22 to 28 feet, and there being simply the round impression of his two toes, it is very difficult to discover its course. We traced these steps back to the spot where we had seen the birds standing, and where the sand was well trodden down. Two Arabs, at once dismounting, began to dig with their hands, and presently brought up four fine fresh eggs, from a depth of about a foot under the warm sand."
Ostrich farming has not only been established in the Cape Colony, but also with great success in Algeria, and in Buenos Ayres, where the African ostrich has been introduced. There can be no doubt but that this industry may be carried on with equal success and profit in our southwestern states, and it is to be hoped that the experiments now in progress in California may give ample returns, and encourage others to invest in this novel branch of "practical ornithology."
That the range of the true ostriches at a former geological period was considerably larger than nowadays is proved by tile rather recent discovery of fossil remains of species from the Siwalik Hills in India. It is named Struthio asiaticus, and is distinguished by a stouter neck than the existing species, to which it' otherwise is so closely related that Mr. Lydekker thinks it doubtful whether the slight differences can be regarded as of more than individual or varietal value.
