The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-01-18
BIG BIRDS OF THE WORLD.
SOME OF THE FEATHERED TRIBE
THAT ARE DISAPPEARING.
The Bustard Nearly Extinct and Cas-
sowaries Becoming Rare-The
Haunts of the Ostrich-COnnecting
Links Between Man and Mammals.

Haunts of the Ostrich-COnnecting
Links Between Man and Mammals.
From the st. Louis Globe-Democrat.
a few months ago number of Russian
patriots petitioned the car to adopt more
efficient measures for protecting the few
remaining forests and prevent the reek-
| less destruction of game in the southern
provinces of the empire, but the young
autocrat seems to be a chip off the old
blockhead, and is too busy suppressing
human rights to find time for the abate
ment of abuses.
Among the denizens of the wilderness
in danger of determination, the petitioners
mentioned the Caucasian urus the ibeX
and the great bustard (Otis torda)-a dis
tant relative of the ostrich, and approach
ing the type of the large gallinaceous
birds, the pheasants and turkeys In size
it exceeds the Norwegian blackjack, and
is, indeed the heaviest creature that ac-
complishes the miracle of aerial naVisa
ton. The old males attain weight of
thirty-hve pounds. and where food is
plenty specimens of thirty-eight and even
forty pounds have been captured with the
aid of greyhounds. The wild turkeys of
our North American forest vary in weight
from sixteen to twenty pounds Twenty
five Founders are evolved on the western
turkey farms, but they cannot fly, and in
consciousness Of their inability. have even
stopped gobbling and are on their good
behavior, like a Texas cattle thief who
has lost his horse and moderates the en-
phasis of his remarks. The bustard can
fly, but only by a supreme effort of his
shoulder muscles, and after Hopping along
for a quarter of mile the old cocks gen.
orally come down with a sWoop and strike
the ground running, trusting for safety to
their sprinting talent. Their wings are of
enormous strength and much broader
than those of the condor, though not quite
as long. The condor, it is true. cannot
| fly, but performs the still stranger trick
of hanging suspended in the rarefeld air
of prodigiouS attitudes, or drifting along
with rigidly motionless wings. but those
wings have, after all, to support only a
moderate weight-hfteen to a maximum
of twenty-five pounds
Thirty-pound bustards in prime condi-
ton settle their courtship combats on the
! wing, and look like dragons thrashing
about in midair or colliding with vio-
lence that knocks off clouds of dark
feathers. But they fight in silence. Their
| struggle for existence is so precarious
| that they cannot afford to throw away
| chance, and WOO even their mates with a
minimum of vocal effort. Instead of
| drumming or gobbling in sight of their
| inamoratas, they indulge in a series of
! grotesque antics. hopping clean out OF the
| grass, ten or twelve times in quick sue
! cession, or SWaying to and fro like estate
| dervishes.
| The female approaches her next with
| extreme circumspection, often only under
| cover of darkness, but in spite of all
these precautions, the doom of the species
is settled. They have disappeared from
NxTna how 90
| almost as frequent as partridges and are
! seen only in small flocks in the sand
| hills skiriting the lower valley of the
Dnieper, and here and there along the
north coast of the Caspian.
How do you suppose a man with such
wads in his pocket can expect to be left
alone in a country like this?" an old
! lawyer of Perry, Okla, asked the cattle
| king, Brooks and in the hungry steppe5
| there is no rest for the king of game
birds. The hen lays a dozen eggs as big
| as Bartlett pears, and the meat of her
mate will furnish a holiday dinner for a
family of five. Merits like that are not
easy to hide, and anywhere between the
| Don and the OXus the sight of n flock of
the slow-sailing monster birds sets a troop
of Cossack hunters a-galloping.
The next larger bird, the cassowary, is
| as incapable of flight as donkey, but it
| can kick like government mule and use
the sharp, bony quilts of its wings as
| cock uses his spurs. 1t weighs sixty
| pounds, as the average of the maie
| adults, and stands six feet high in its
| usual hump-backed attitude, but can stiff
fen out into high-headed dignity of ten
| inches more; and it would be a mystery
| how a creature of that size could solve
| the problem of survival in such small
| islands as the Mcluccas, if, like guerrilla
| Gen. Maceo, it had not been able to fight
the battle for existence under cover.
! Booro Amboyna and the Banda islands
| are not much bigger than a. German prin-
| cipality and boast an industrious popu-
| lation, but the settlements are chiefly con-
| fined to the coast plains, while the hills
| and intermediate valleys are covered
with an almost impenetrable jungle
| wholly impenetrable to dogs and men. A
| species of wild hogs, with hide an inch
| thick, do make their way through these
| thickets but get their shouts ripped into
1 shreds and the protective armor of the
! cassowary beats theirs ten to one. Its
| head is protected by a bony crest, a per-
feet helmet, reaching from the base of
| the beak to far below the ears, and COM
| ing down left and right in ridges over
| hanging the eyes like wrinkled brows. the
| whole as hard as the horn of a rhinoce-
| ros which, by the way, serve a sim
| liar purpose in addition to its strategic
! functions The skin of the neck is wrin-
! kled and as tough as caoutchouc, and then
! comes the curious mar ndnJle, layer ABOVE
! layer of stout, long bristles reaching from
| the callous neck to the scale-covered legs,
| the ascles along the shins resembling the
| overlapping pads of a Circassian mail
| coat.
Thus protected, the cassowary can rush
| headong into jUngles where not angels
| only. but tapirs, would fear to tread With
| a hunter at its heels 1t will dart straight
/ into thickets where a tough little dog has
to squeeze in edgeways; but the hen does
] not always like to sit on thorns. After a
/ heavy rain the cock is tempted to intro
! duce his harem to the pleasure walks of
| sunny glade. where enemies with lmprov-
ed firearms may Turk in ambush. For
| dog or a club-armed native the stout-legg-
| ed cock was more than a match. but no
/ kicking avais against the bullet of As
| caliber Winchester.
| n is the same with the African ostrich.
retween 1880 and 1860 the value OF the ex-
| oorted feathers steadily decreased, then
/ rose one-third; but the main cause of the
| increase was the Introduction of long
| range rifles The blunderbuss muskets of
the poor wandering Arab were almost as