Six Months at the Cape by R. M. Ballantyne (read any book .txt) 📕

Ostrich-farming is no child’s play. It involves risk in more ways than one, and sometimes taxes both the courage and strength of the farmer.

In ordinary circumstances the ostrich is a mild, inoffensive creature—indeed the female is always so; but when a male ostrich is what I may style nesting—when, enclosed in a large field or paddock, he guards his wives and his eggs—no lion of the desert, no tiger of the jungle or kloof, is more ferocious or more savagely bent on the death of any or all who dare to intrude on his domain.

The power of the ostrich, too, is quite equal to his strength of will. He stands from seven to nine feet in height, and is very heavy.

His tremendous legs are his only weapons, and his kick is almost, if not quite, equal to that of a horse. Possessing enormous feet, with two toes on each, the horny points of which can cut and rip like cold chisels, he rushes at an adversary and kicks, or hits out, straightforward, like a prize-fighter. No unarmed man on earth could stand long before a furious male ostrich without being killed. But there are one or two weak points about him, which abate somewhat the danger of his attack. In the first place his power lies only in his mighty legs, the thighs of which—blue-grey and destitute of feathers—are like two shoulders of mutton. With his beak he can do nothing, and his long neck is so weak that if you can only lay hold of it and pull his head to the ground you are comparatively safe, for he cannot kick effectively in that position, and devotes all his energies, when thus caught, to useless attempts to pull his head out of your grasp. But, then, how are you to get hold of that neck—the root of which stands nearly as high as your own head—in the face of two claws that go like battering-rams wrought by lightning? As well might you attempt to lay hold of a prize-fighter’s nose while his active fists are darting out at you.

A powerful, active man has been known, when attacked while unarmed, to spring on the bird, grasp a wing with one arm and the body with the other, and hug it, but there is great danger in this method, because in the attempt you are pretty sure to receive at least one kick, and that, if it takes effect, will be quite sufficient to put you out of action. It also requires much power of endurance, for, hugging a creature that is strong enough to dance about and lift you off your legs in its wild efforts to get rid of you, must be hard work. Supposing that you do succeed, however, in holding on until you work your way along to the neck and get the head into custody, then you can without much difficulty choke the bird, but a male ostrich costs about 150 pounds, and one hesitates to choke 150 pounds, even for the sake of one’s life, especially when the valuable bird belongs to one’s friend.

Another and perhaps the best plan, if you are caught unarmed, is to lie down. An ostrich cannot kick you when you lie flat on the ground, he can only dance on you, and although that process is unpleasant it is not necessarily fatal.

The ostrich is easily killed by a blow on the neck with a stout stick, but this is as objectionable as the choking process, on the ground of cost. In short, the only legitimate method of meeting a savage papa, in his own field, is with a strong forked pole eight or nine feet long, with which you catch the bird at the root of the neck, and thus keeping him at pole’s-length, let him kick and hiss away to his heart’s content till he is tired, or until assistance comes to you, or until you work him near a wall, when you may jump over and escape, for an ostrich will not jump.

Often have I gone, thus armed, with my friend Hobson to feed the nesting ostriches. The risk of attack, I may mention in passing, is not great when two men go together, because the bird seems undecided which foe to attack, and generally ends by condescending to pick at the mealies, (Indian corn), which are thrown down to him.

One morning Hobson and his eldest son Six-foot Johnny and I mounted our steeds and rode away to the field in which one of the male ostriches dwelt with his meek brown wives. The wives are always brown, the husbands are jet-black, with the exception of those magnificent and pure white feathers in wings and tail which are so much prized and worn by the fair dames of Europe. Hobson carried a sack of mealies at his saddle-bow.

There were several male birds on the farm, all of which were distinguished by name. There were “Master,” and “David Marais,” and “Black Jack,” and “Blind-boy,” (minus one eye!) and “Gouws,” etcetera. Our visit that morning was to David Marais. David was by far the fiercest of the lot, but he was excessively fond of mealies, and could be attracted—though by no means appeased—by these.

“Johnny,” said Hobson, as we cantered along by the side of the little stream which caused a strip of bright fertility to wind like a green-snake over the brown Karroo, and which was, as it were, the life-blood of the farm, “Johnny, I want you to go to the nest and count the eggs, while I keep David in play.”

“Very well, father.”

The order, and the quiet acceptance of it, did not seem to involve much, yet Johnny had been ordered on somewhat dangerous service that morning, for David Marais was intensely watchful as well as savage. Several of the other males, although capable of giving way to temper, were so far amiable that my friend and I had frequently gone into their enclosures with our forked sticks and mealies, and had received no worse at their hands than a threatening attitude or a suspicious look, which passed away when the food was thrown down; but David’s temper was such that we never ventured into his paddock, contenting ourselves by throwing the mealies over the hedge or wall that bounded the field. This field, or enclosure, by the way, was not a small piece of ground which one could take in at a glance. It was more than a mile in extent, undulating in form, with a stream bisecting it, and mimosa bushes scattered here and there, so that from any one point you could not see the entire field, or ascertain its exact form or size. Sometimes, on going into such a field, one has to look about for the birds—also to “look out” for them, as they are prone to sudden assault!

But David Marais required no looking for. His large eagle-eye had detected us from afar, and we found him at the nearest extremity of the nearest angle of his grounds ready to give us battle, pacing slowly to and fro, with that peculiar motion of the wings which indicates suppressed wrath.

We rode along close to his hedge a short distance, and he marched with us, brushing against the hedge and showing an anxious desire to get at us. If there had been a gap in that hedge he would have charged like a thunderbolt, but there was no gap, and it is a strange fact that an ostrich cannot leap—at least he will not. The merest trifle of an obstruction—a bit of wall or hedge over which he could step with perfect ease—is sufficient to check his advance and keep him in; that is, if he walks up to it, but he is a stupid bird, and if he runs up to such an obstruction he may tumble over it, gather himself up on the other side, and so continue the charge.

On reaching a part of the hedge which dipped into a hollow, Hobson dismounted and opened the sack with the peace-offering. The bird, after breasting up to the hedge and finding it impassable, sat down on what may be styled his elbows, scraped his wings on the ground, and rolled his head and neck about in a fashion that is indescribable. This, I was told, was his