from fix to eight feet in height *. It has a filial] head,, not
much unlike that of a Gooje -, the bill is alfo fomewhat fimilar,
but lefs deprefied, and four inches and a half in length, horn-
coloured, with a dulky tip : irides hazel ; eyelids befet with
hairs : the head, and greateft part of the neck, are bare of feathers,
of a fiefh-colour, here and there befet With a few fcattere’d
hairs the. lower parts of the neck and body are covered with
black feathers, which are fingularly loofe in their webs, and
totally unlike thofe of any other bird: the quill feathers, and
thofe of the tail, are of a perfefl: fnowy white, fome of them here
and there fringed or tipped with black, and are long and beautifully
waved in lhape : on each wing are two fpurs, about an
inch in length » and on the breaft is a callous, bare, and hard
fubftance, ferving the bird to reft on when it firft bends forwards-
to fit on the ground : the thighs and fides o f the body are
naked: the legs are ftrong, of a greyilh brown, and furnilhed
with two toes only, the outer one of which is very Ihort, and
without a claw*
The female differs from the male in having thofe feathers
brown, which are black in the mate.
This bird inhabits Africa, and the parts of Afia adjoining toit,
with the feveral iflands in the neighbourhood, and is in very
great plenty about the Cape of Good Hope. The egg of this cor-
refponds well with the fize of the bird, being as big as a child’s
head, and white in colour f : the female is fuppofed to lay fifty
* Two OJlriches were fhewn in London in the year 1750 ; the male was ten f?et
in height, and weighed three hundred weight and a quarter.— See Gent. Mag-
vol. xx. p. 536.
f See a figure in Klein, Ov. pi. 1-
or
Femalb.
P lace and
Manners»