The load was heavy, though, and he shook his head, with reason, for such a bird weighed three hundred pounds, and it spoke well for its leg muscles that it could go at the rate of forty or fifty miles an hour.
“Too big,” grumbled Jack; so Dyke seized one of the legs, and together they walked away with the dead bird, dragging it quite a quarter of a mile out beyond the ostrich-pens, ready for the jackals to come and play scavenger. After which Dyke returned to his brother, and they went in to where Tanta Sal, Jack’s wife, had prepared a substantial meal.
Chapter Five.
Big Birdnesting.
“You’re a dissatisfied young dog, Dyke,” cried Joe Emson good-humouredly, as he smiled down from his high horse at his brother; “always grumbling.”
“I’m not,” cried Dyke indignantly.
“You are, boy. Just as if any one could be low-spirited when he is young and strong, out in this wide free place on such a lovely morning.”
“It’s all right enough now,” replied Dyke, “because it’s early and cool; but it is so horribly lonely.”