When the ostrich is feeding his pace is from twenty to twenty-two inches; when walking, but not feeding, it is twenty-six inches; and when terrified, as in the case noticed, it is from eleven and a half to thirteen and even fourteen feet in length.  Only in one case was I at all satisfied of being able to count the rate of speed by a stop-watch, and, if I am not mistaken, there were thirty in ten seconds; generally one’s eye can no more follow the legs than it can the spokes of a carriage-wheel in rapid motion.  If we take the above number, and twelve feet stride as the average pace, we have a speed of twenty-six miles an hour.  It can not be very much above that, and is therefore slower than a railway locomotive.  They are sometimes shot by the horseman making a cross cut to their undeviating course, but few Englishmen ever succeed in killing them.

The ostrich begins to lay her eggs before she has fixed on a spot for a nest, which is only a hollow a few inches deep in the sand, and about a yard in diameter.  Solitary eggs, named by the Bechuanas “lesetla”, are thus found lying forsaken all over the country, and become a prey to the jackal.  She seems averse to risking a spot for a nest, and often lays her eggs in that of another ostrich, so that as many as forty-five have been found in one nest.  Some eggs contain small concretions of the matter which forms the shell, as occurs also in the egg of the common fowl:  this has given rise to the idea of stones in the eggs.  Both male and female assist in the incubations; but the numbers of females being always greatest, it is probable that cases occur in which the females have the entire charge.  Several eggs lie out of the nest, and are thought to be intended as food for the first of the newly-hatched brood till the rest come out and enable the whole to start in quest of food.  I have several times seen newly-hatched young in charge of the cock, who made a very good attempt at appearing lame in the plover fashion, in order to draw off the attention of pursuers.  The young squat down and remain immovable when too small to run far, but attain a wonderful degree of speed when about the size of common fowls.  It can not be asserted that ostriches are polygamous, though they often appear to be so.  When caught they are easily tamed, but are of no use in their domesticated state.

The egg is possessed of very great vital power.  One kept in a room during more than three months, in a temperature about 60 Deg., when broken was found to have a partially-developed live chick in it.  The Bushmen carefully avoid touching the eggs, or leaving marks of human feet near them, when they find a nest.  They go up the wind to the spot, and with a long stick remove some of them occasionally, and, by preventing any suspicion, keep the hen laying on for months, as we do with fowls.  The eggs have a strong, disagreeable flavor, which only the keen appetite of the Desert can reconcile one to.  The Hottentots use their trowsers to carry home the twenty or twenty-five eggs usually found in a nest; and it has happened that an Englishman, intending to imitate this knowing dodge, comes to the wagons with blistered legs, and, after great toil, finds all the eggs uneatable, from having been some time sat upon.  Our countrymen invariably do best when they continue to think, speak, and act in their own proper character.