Life on an Ostrich Farm.

Auckland Star, Volume XXII, Issue 139, 13 June 1891, Page 3 (Supplement)

Life on an Ostrich Farm.

Grumpy men have sometimes said that women aro deficient in humour ; but Mrs Martin's « Home Life on an Ostrich Farm • (George Phillip and Son) ought to make such critics feel very small indeed. There is nob an uninberesbing page in bhis entertaining book; while there are very few pages indeed which do not contain something genuinely funny. Mrs Martin seems to have really enjoyed her South African experiences, despite the stupidity of ostriches, the exasperating wars of the native servants.and the disasters brought down by the sudden tropical rains. The book does not prebend to be, like Messrs Mosenthal and Harting's volume, a scientific handbook of ostrich farming. Ib is a gossipy record of experience, admirably written (Borne of ib was firsb printed in the * St. James' Gazette ' and some in the 'Saturday Review') full of amusement and high spirits. Running Away. Mrs Martin soon found that ostriches are exceedingly fond of running away; and how they do run ! Only startle an ostrich, and very little is sufficient to do this, his nerves being of the feeble, and ' his heart in his mouth' ab even bhe smallest or mosb imaginary danger. Whab a jump ho gives, and whab a swerve to one side ! Surely ib must have dislocated some of his joints. But no ! off he goes, flinging out his clumsy legs, and twisting himself aboub as he runs, bill you almosb'expect to see him come to pieces, or, at any rate, fling off a leg, aa a lobster casts a claw or a frightened lizard parts from its tail. An ostrich's joints seem to be all loose, like bhose of a lay-figure when nob properly tightened up. Ho rapidly disappears from view; and the last you see of him is, as Mark Twain has it, 'still running'—apparently with no intention of stopping till he has reached the very centre of Africa. Bub his mad scamper will mosb probably end a few miles off, wibh a bumble into a wire fence and a broken log. Sometimes, however, ostriches, when bhey bake fright, run so long and got so far away that bheir owners never recover bhem. One we heard of, bo whose tail a mischievous boy had tied a newspaper, went off at railway speed, and no tidings of it were ever received. The Pugnacity of the Ostrich. The ostrich is a most suspicious and pugnacious creature:—On one of the farms a sturdy new-comer, six feet in height, starting for an early morning walk, was cautioned against going into a certain camp where the ostriches were dangerous. He laughed ab his friends' advice, told them he was ' nob afraid of a dicky-bird !' and— disdaining the proffered tackey (a bib of mimosa-bush)—started off sbraighbway in bhe forbidden direction. He did nob reburn home to dinner; a search was made for him ; and eventually he was found perched up on a high ironstone boulder, jusb oub of reach of a large ostrich, which was doing sentry, walking up and down, and keeping a vicious eye on him. There he had sat for hours, nearly, roasted alive (ironstone boulders can get so hob in the sun thab ib blisters your hand bo touch bhem); and ho would "have had to sit till sundown bad nob the timely appearance of his friends relieved him of tho too pressing attention of the 'dickey-birds.' Another gentleman had a theory that any creature, however savage, could be subdued—'quelled,' as he said—by tho human eye. One day he tried to quell one of his own ostriches, with the result that he was presently found by T in a very pitiable predicament, lying flat on the ground, while the subject of his experiment jumped up and down on him, occasionally varying bhe treabment by sibting on him. Greep and Retribution. Mrs Marbin tells a funnystoryofhowretribution befell a tame and greedy ostrich :— Being free of the kitchen—simply because no one could keep him oub—he was not long in observing that the pumpkin and rice always came out of one particular pot; and, the idea suddenly occurring to him that he could do no better than go straight to the fountain-head for his favourite dish, he walked up, full of joyful anticipations, to the fire where this pot was bubbling. The cook —who, being mother to several of the ill-used children, did not lovo Jackie— offered no friendly interference to save him from his fate; and plunging his bill into the pot, be greedily scooped up and, with the lightning-like rapidity of ostriches, tossed down his throat a large mouthful of boiling rice. Poor fellow ! the next moment be was dancing round the kitchen, writhing with agony, shaking his head nearly off, and twisting his neck as if bent on tying ib in a knot. Finally he dashed wildly from the house ; the cook, avenged at last for all the dinners he had devoured, called after him as he stumbled oub of bhe door, ' Serve you righb, Jackie!'—and away he fled across bhe veldb, bill the last bhab was seen of him was a libble cloud of whibe dusb vanishing on the horizon. He returned a sadder and a wiser bird ; and ib was long before he again ventured inside the kitchen. Eating a Diamond. Ostriches, like blackbirds, are very fond of anybhing that glitters. One of them tried to snatch one of Mrs Martin's oarrings, and the ear with it. On another occasion he was more succesful. A newlyarrived gentleman was looking over a fence into a camp, when the sharp eye of an ostrich espied a beautiful diamond in his pin, and in an instanb the jewel was picked oub and swallowed. A kind of court-martial was held on the ostrich ; the relative values of himself and the diamond being accurately calculated, that his judges might decide whether he should live or die. Fortunabely for him, ib was jusb the time when ostriches were expensive ; and his valuo was estimated ab £100, while the diamond was only worth £90. That £10 saved his life, and the diamond was allowed to remain and perform the parb of an extra good millstone in his interior. A Baboon in a Swoon. •Sarah,' one of the pets on the farm, was a female baboon, which had been tame from infancy. She dearly loved sweets, which were often given to her wrapped up in a multitude of papers, one inside the other. It was amusing to watch bho patient and deliberate manner in which she would unfold each paper in turn, taking the greatesb care never bo tear one, and proceeding with all the caution of a good Mahommedan fearful of inadvertently injuring a portion of the Koran. This time, instead of the tit-bit, a dead night-adder was wrapped up and presented. When she unfolded the inn .rmost paper, and bhe snake slipped out, with a horrid writhe, across her hand, Sarah quickly sank backwards and fainted away, her lips turning perfectly white. By dint of throwing water over her, chafing her hands and bathing her lipa with brandy, she was revived from her swoon, thouorh np*> -.}_)%->«.. noma di£B-"*-. v

Where was the Kitten? Another pet was Jacob, a more than usually comical and greedy secretarybird. He was like a boa constrictor in his capacity for ' putbing himself oubside' bhe animals on which he fed —lizards, rats, boads, trogs, fab juicy locusbs, young chickens, alas ! and some of bhe smaller pets if lefb incautiously within his reach, even little kitbens — all wenb down whole. The lasb-named animals were his delicacy, and he was fortunabe bo geb plenty of them. His enormous appebibe, and our difficulty in satisfying it, were well-known in the neighbourhood, and the owners of several prolific cats, instead of drowning the superfluous progeny, bestowed bhem on us as offerings bo Jacob. They were killed and given bo him ab the rate of one a day. Once, however, by an unlucky accident, one of them got inbo his clutches without the preliminary knock on bhe head ; and the old barbarian swallowed it alive. For some minutes we could hear the poor thing mewing piteously in Jacob's interior, while he himself stood bhere lisbening and looking all round in a puzzled manner bo see where bhe noise came from. He evidently thought there was another kibten somewhere, and seemed much disappointed ab not finding it. The Value of Ostriches. The ostrich is not now the potentiality of wealth that he was a few years ago. In the early days of ostrich-farming (Mrs Marbin says) splendid fortunes were made. Then feathers were worbh £100 per lb, bho plumes of one bird ab a single plucking realising on an average £25. For a good pair of breeding-birds £400, or even £500, was no uncommon price ; and libble chicks only jusb oub ot the egg were worth £10 each. Indeed, bhe unhabched eggs have sometimes been valued ab bhe same amounb. Bub since bhe supply has become so much greaber than bhe demand, things are sadly changed for the farmers; our besb pair of osbriches would nob now sell for more bhan £12, and experience has baughb us bo look for no higher sum bhan bhirby shillings for bhe feathers of bhe handsome bird ab one plucking. Ab bhe same bime, if a lady wishes to buy a good feather in London or Paris, she has to cay nearly the same price as in former times.