From North Pole to Equator: Studies of Wild Life and Scenes in Many Lands

by Alfred Edmund Brehm

No one who stays for any length of time in the steppe-land can fail to observe a large bird of prey, whose appearance as he flies, owing to the beautiful contour of the long pointed wings and exceedingly short tail, mark him off from every other feathered robber, whose flight moreover surpasses that of all creatures which fly. High above the ground he flies, hovers, glides, tumbles, flutters, dances, and throws himself headlong. As large as an eagle, he expands his great wings, and remains for a moment in the same position without any movement; he beats them violently, raises them high above his body, twists them and whirls them; he closes them and is precipitated almost to the ground; he gives a few powerful strokes, and in a few minutes has ascended to immeasurable heights. As he approaches the ground we see his vividly contrasted colours—the velvet black of the head, neck, breast, and belly, the silver white on the under surface of his wings, the light chestnut-brown of his tail; he throws himself headlong, and we notice the bright colour of the back resembling that of the tail and a broad light band on the wings; he comes still nearer, and we may perhaps detect the coral-red beak and cheeks and talons. If we question one of the nomad herdsmen observant of the animal life of the steppe in regard to this striking and altogether remarkable bird of prey, we may hear from his lips this significant and suggestive story. “To him,” he says, “the goodness of the All-merciful has given rich gifts, and, above all, high wisdom. For he is a physician among the birds of heaven, familiar with the diseases which visit the children of the Creator, and knowing all the herbs and roots with which to heal them. From far-off lands thou mayest see him bear the roots, but in vain dost thou seek to discover whither he is summoned to heal the sick. The working of his remedies is unfailing; to partake of them brings life, to reject them is to invite death; they are as the Hedijah written by the hand of God’s messenger, a precept of Mohammed, whom we reverence in humility. To the poor in the eyes of the Lord, to the sons of Adam, it is not forbidden to make use of them. Take note of where the physician-eagle has his dwelling, refrain from injuring his eggs, wait till the feathers of his young no longer draw any blood, and then go to his home and wound the body of one of his children. Thereupon shalt thou perceive the father fly towards morning in the direction in which thou turnest to pray. Be not discouraged in waiting for his return, have patience! He will appear bearing with him a root; frighten him so that he may leave it to thee, take it without fear; for it comes from the Lord, in whose hand are the issues of life, and it is free from all witchcraft. Then hasten to heal thy sick; they shall all recover, for so it is appointed to them by the Father of Mercies.”

The bird which forms the subject of this poetic legend is the bateleur or short-tailed African eagle—the “Heaven’s ape” of the Abyssinians. The roots which, according to the legend, it carries, are snakes, which it picks up. Seldom does one see the bird rest; usually it flies, as has been described, until the sight of a snake induces it to hurl itself downwards and to engage in battle. Like all the snake-eating birds of prey, it is well protected against the venomous fangs by the thick horny plates on its talons and by its dense plumage; it is therefore unafraid of the most deadly snake, and is a true benefactor of the steppe-land. It is not this beneficence, however, but its marvellous flight that has won renown for the African eagle in the eyes of all the peoples among whom it has its home.

Fig. 28.—On an Ostrich Farm in South Africa.

The ostrich, which is bound to the earth, stands in striking contrast to the short-tailed eagle. He also is the hero of an Arabian legend, which, however, instead of glorifying him, brings him down to the dust; for the story is that the ostrich wished, in the exuberance of his vanity, to fly to the sun, but was in his attempt miserably burned, and hurled in his present form to the ground. To us his life is all the more worthy of consideration, that many false ideas still prevail both in regard to it and in regard to the bird himself.

Although occurring in those low grounds of the African and West Asiatic deserts which are richest in vegetation, the ostrich becomes abundant only in the steppe. Here one is almost continually crossing his unmistakable “spoor”, though it is but rarely that one sees the bird. He is tall enough to see over the lofty grasses which conceal him, he is far-sighted and shy, and can therefore usually conceal himself from the approaching traveller. If one succeeds in observing him from a distance, one sees that, except at the breeding season, he is fond of a comfortable and easy-going life. In the early morning, and in the evening, the troop feed busily; at noon they all lie resting and digesting on the ground; sometimes they go together to water or to bathe (even in the sea); later on, they amuse themselves with marvellous dances,[48] jumping round in a circle as if out of their senses, fanning with their wing-plumes as if they would attempt to fly; at sunset they betake themselves to rest, but without neglecting to secure their safety. If a formidable enemy threaten them they rush off in wild flight, and soon leave him far behind; if a weaker carnivore sneak upon them, they strike him to the ground with their extremely powerful legs. Thus the course of their life runs smoothly, provided that there be no lack of food. Of this they require an enormous quantity. Their voracity is astounding, and not less is the capacity of their stomach to receive vast quantities of all sorts of things, which are either digested, or are retained without injury. Almost everything vegetable, from root-tubers to fruits, is accepted by their stomachs, which have now become proverbial; and so is it with small animals, both vertebrate and invertebrate. But such things by no means exhaust their menu. The ostrich swallows whatever can be swallowed, gulping down stones a pound in weight, and in captivity not disdaining pieces of tiles, oakum, rags, knives, single keys and bunches of keys, nails, pieces of glass and crockery, leaden balls, bells, and many other such things. Indeed, it may fall a victim to its indiscriminating appetite by devouring such stuff as unslaked lime. In the stomach of one which died in captivity there was found a heterogeneous mass weighing in all about nine pounds. In the poultry-yard the greedy bird swallows ducklings and chickens as if they were oysters; it dismantles walls to fill its gizzard with the loose mortar; in short, it will eat anything which is not a fixture. In proportion to the amount of food which it requires—and that is not out of proportion to its size and activity—so is its thirst. Thus it frequents those places where it finds not only abundance of nutritious plants, but also water-basins or springs. If both fail, the ostriches are forced to migrate, and in such cases they often cover great distances.

With the coming of spring the mating instinct awakens in the heart of the ostrich, and then it changes its habit of life in a remarkable manner. The troops or herds break up into small groups, and the adult males begin their long-continued combats for mates. Excited to the highest pitch, as is outwardly indicated by the vivid reddening of neck and legs, two rivals stand opposed; they fan their wings so that the full splendour of their fluffy white plumes is displayed; they move their long necks in a scarce describable fashion, twisting and bending now forwards, now sideways; they utter deep and hoarse sounds, sometimes suggestive of a muffled drum, sometimes even of the roaring of lions; they stare at one another; they bend down on the soles of their feet, and move their necks and wings more rapidly and persistently than before; then they spring up again and rush at one another, seeking, in the swift encounter, to strike their opponent a powerful blow with the foot, and with the sharp-cutting toe-nail to make long, deep gashes on body and legs. The victor in the combat is not more gentle to the mate or mates which he has won, in fact he abuses them shamefully with bullying and blows. It is not at present perfectly certain whether a male keeps company with one female or with several;[49] it may be accepted as a fact, however, that several females often lay in the same nest, and it has been observed that the female does not undertake the whole responsibility of sitting on the eggs, but leaves much of this to the male, who, after about eight weeks’ brooding, also leads about the young and tends them. In both brooding and tending, the female does assist, but the male always has the larger share, and in leading about the young brood he shows more carefulness and solicitude than does the mother-bird. The young ostriches, when hatched, are about the size of an average hen, and come into the world with a remarkable suit of feathers, more like the bristly coat of a mammal than the customary down of young birds. As they exhibit the characteristic voracity of their race from the day of their birth, they grow quickly, and after two or three months they change their plumage and put on a garb resembling that of the female. At least three years must pass, however, before they are fully grown or ready for pairing.

Such, in briefest statement, are the essential facts in regard to the life-history of the giant bird of the steppe; all the stories which are inconsistent with my summary are more or less fabulous.

The bird of the night in regard to which I wish to say a few words is the night-jar or goat-sucker, whose race is represented at home by one species, but in the steppe by several somewhat remarkable forms. When the first star is seen in the evening sky these gayest and most charming of nocturnal birds begin to be active. During the day it is only by chance that we ever see one, and we scarce believe in its powers of enlivening the steppe-land. But, when night falls, at least one is sure to make its appearance. Attracted to the camp-fire like the scorpion and the viper, the softly-flying bird flits in ever-changing course around the watchers, alights near them for a moment, delivers a few strophes of its whirring night-song, which reminds one of a cat’s purring, is off again into the dusk, only to reappear in a few minutes, and so on until morning. One species is especially fascinating, the flag-winged night-jar, or “four-winged bird” of the natives. Its decorative peculiarity consists of a long feather which grows out between the primaries and secondaries[50] of each wing, without any vane except at the broad tip, and far exceeding all the other feathers in length, being in fact almost exactly half a yard in length. Eerily, like some ghost, this night-jar flies and flutters. It looks as if it were being constantly pursued by two others of smaller size, or as if it could divide itself into two or three birds, or as if it had indeed four wings. But it has all the charms of its race, and soon becomes a welcome visitor, contributing, like its fellows, not a little to alleviate most pleasantly the discomforts of the night.

Like the birds, the mammals of the steppe are rich alike in numbers and in species. The abundant vegetation supports not only countless herds of antelopes, which are justly regarded as most characteristic of this region, but also buffaloes and wild boars, zebras and wild asses, elephants and rhinoceroses, the “serafe”, or giraffes, as we call them, besides a host of rodents with which we have only a general acquaintance. Against this dense population of herbivores, the numerous carnivores of the steppe wage unceasing war, and this is probably even to the advantage of the former, since, without some such check, the ruminants and rodents would tend to multiply beyond the limits of subsistence afforded even by the rich vegetation of this region. The uniformity of the North African steppes and the relatively (though not really) frequent occurrence of standing and flowing water hinder the formation of those immense mobs of antelopes which are observed in the Karroo of South Africa; everywhere, however, we come across these elegant, fine-eyed ruminants, singly, in small herds, or in considerable companies, and they seem to keep to approximately the same spots in summer and winter. Zebras and wild asses, on the other hand, are only found on the dry heights; the giraffe lives exclusively in the thin woods, while the rhinoceros almost always seeks the densest growths; the elephant entirely avoids broad open tracts, and the ill-tempered buffaloes cling to the moist low ground. On these last, as on the tame herds of cattle, the lion preys, while the cunning leopard and the nimble, untiring cheetah, are more given to stalking the antelopes; the jackals and steppe-wolves prefer the hares; the foxes, civets, and polecats seek the small rodents and those birds which live on the ground.