This bird buries its eggs in the sand, burrowing for each a slanting hole from 3 to 4 feet deep.
Brief mention will serve for the Guinea-fowls and Turkeys, since they are well known to us all. Guinea-fowls are African birds. The farmyard form, popularly known as "Come-backs," from their peculiar cry "come-back, come-back, come-back," is a descendant of the common helmeted form, of which type there are eight distinct species. Besides these are four crested species; one very beautiful species known as the Vulture-like Guinea-fowl; and one, the rarest of all, known as the Black Guinea-fowl. Even in the British Museum, writes Mr. Ogilvie Grant, "there are only two examples of it, and neither of these are perfect specimens." It was discovered by M. Du Chaillu. "One day," he says, "I went out hunting by myself, and, to my great joy, shot another new bird, a black wild-fowl, one of the most singular birds I have seen in Africa.... The head, where it is bare, is in the female of a pink hue, and in the male of a bright scarlet.... Wild they are, and most difficult to approach, and rare, even in the forests where they are at home." They do not travel in huge flocks, like other guinea-fowls, but a male and two females at most.
The familiar form of the Turkey scarcely needs description; but most people are probably puzzled by its name. Why Turkey? The bird is a native of America, so it certainly cannot have anything to do with its place of origin. Professor Newton has it that it is on account of its call-note, "to be syllabled 'turk, turk, turk,' whereby it may almost be said to have named itself."
The domesticated turkey is descended from the Mexican Turkey, and was probably introduced into Europe during the sixteenth century. This, according to Captain Bendire, is a mountain-living species, and still abundant in the wilder portions of Western Texas and New Mexico. It appears to attain greater bulk than its domesticated descendant, Captain Bendire having recorded a specimen shot by himself which weighed 28 lbs. after having been drawn, and heavier birds are said to occur occasionally.
The Mexicans say that the coyotes catch turkeys by running in circles under the tree in which they are roosting, till the birds get dizzy with watching them, and fall down into the open mouths below!
There are three distinct kinds of turkey—the Mexican, American, and Honduras Turkey. The last is a very fine bird, with a bright blue head and neck, instead of red. The top of the head is adorned with numerous scarlet, berry-like warts, looking like holly-berries.
The Bob-whites, which belong to the group of tooth-billed game-birds known as American Partridges and Quails, demand a brief reference here. The species represented in the illustration on page [399] is common in the lowlands of Texas. It is a very unsuspicious bird, and in consequence falls an easy prey to foxes, hariers, and rattlesnakes, the last-named being the worst enemies, as many as five of these unfortunate birds having been taken at one time from the stomach of one of these monsters, and on another occasion a female and half a dozen of her eggs were similarly discovered.
The Megapodes and Brush-turkeys, though dull and uninteresting-looking birds, are, on account of the facts connected with the propagation of their species, quite remarkable. They do not brood over their eggs, as do other birds, but instead bury them, either in sand in the neighbourhood of warm springs or in heaps of decaying vegetable matter. In the latter case the material is often collected by several birds working together. Mounds of 8 feet high and 60 feet in circumference have been found, the work of the Nicobar Megapode. Such have been many years in use, material being added each season. Into this mass the female digs down and deposits an egg every second day, covering it up as soon as laid. There it remains till hatched, when the young, probably aided by its mother, forces its way up to the surface, and emerges, not a downy nestling as one would expect, but clothed with feathers differing but slightly in texture from those worn in the adult state. Owing to the precocious development, young megapodes are able to fly within an hour after birth.
Photo by Scholastic Photo. Co.] [Parson's Green.