But really, if any creature can eat nails and screws and bits of glass, as John's ostrich could, it makes little difference whether it eats fast or slow. These things, however, never made the ostrich sick. He ate them just as the canary-bird eats gravel, and they agreed with him.
After John had finished feeding his ostrich he turned and went into the house, and the ostrich, knowing he was to get nothing more, put up his funny little wings, and off he went on his long legs like the wind. No one tried to stop him, although two or three men stood by, for in the first place, no one could do it, and in the second, Perry—that was his name—used to go off this way every day.
Of course John did not live in this country, but in the southern part of Africa, where his father was an English officer. Perry was a tame ostrich, and had been given to John when the boy was quite a little fellow, and many a good time they had had together. Sometimes they would go out walking; but Perry was not fond of this, because John went so slowly, even when he ran. The best arrangement was for John to ride. Perry would stand perfectly still, and Captain Richards would put John on his back. John would catch tight hold of Perry's neck, and away they would go. Go! Why, a race-horse was slow to him. His legs just twinkled as he ran, and you could no more have seen them than you can count the spokes in a carriage wheel when it is rapidly turning. Perry was strong enough to carry Captain Richards, but the Captain could not bear his speed as John did, for it almost took his breath away; and once, he said, he began to be afraid he would die before Perry stopped. But John did not mind it. He liked it, and when he came to England on a visit, and rode his cousin's pony, he thought it was like going to a funeral.
When Perry was standing still he was not very handsome. He was dull in color, and his splendid feathers often looked dingy and ragged. His head was small, but his legs were so long that when John was seven years old he did not come to the top of them. When he ran, however, Perry looked splendid. He held his head firmly, he opened his queer little wings, his fine plume-like tail was erect, and every feather seemed to make him swifter and lighter, and he would go round and round like a gust of wind, and then, swooping closer, would fly back to John for a bit of iron, or perhaps a handful of grass.
Captain Richards told John why the ostrich was called the "camel-bird." The Arabs have a story that a King once said to the ostrich, "Fly," and it answered, "I can not, for I am a camel." So then he said, "Carry," and it replied, "I can not, for I am a bird." So, while it has the endurance of a camel and the swiftness of a bird, it will neither bear a burden nor fly through the air; and so, as John said, is neither, and yet both.
But one thing he could do. He could see very far. Some of the natives said he could see six miles, but John did not believe that. He thought no creature could see from his father's house to General Howard's, and that was only five miles away.
The one person who did not like Perry was Mrs. Richards. She used to be afraid to see John mounted on him, and, as she said, if Perry chose to run off into the wilds with John, who could stop him?
"But he won't," said her husband. "A tame ostrich is sure to come home to be fed."
"Well, he may throw the child off," she would reply.
"That depends on John himself, and I don't believe he will let go."