The Little Bustard, (Otis Tetrax, Linn. La Petite Outarde, Buff.) is in length only seventeen inches. The bill is pale brown; irides red; the top of the head is black, spotted with pale rust colour; the sides of the head, the chin, and throat, are of a reddish white, marked with a few dark spots; the whole neck is black, encircled with an irregular band of white near the top and bottom; the back and wings are rust colour, mottled with brown, and crossed with fine irregular black lines, the under parts of the body, and outer edges of the wings, are white: the tail consists of eighteen feathers; the middle ones are tawny, barred with black, the others are white marked with a few irregular bands of black, the legs are grey. The female is smaller, and has not the black collar on the neck; in other respects she nearly resembles the male.
This bird is very uncommon in this country: and we have seen only two of them, both females. The figure was drawn from one sent by W. Trevelyan, Esq. which was taken on the edge of Newmarket heath, and kept alive about three weeks in a kitchen, where it was fed with bread and other things, such as poultry eat. It is very common in France, where it is also a very shy and cunning bird; if disturbed it flies two or three hundred paces, not far from the ground, and then runs away much faster than any one can follow on foot. The female lays her eggs in June, to the number of three or four, of a glossy green colour: as soon as the young are hatched, she leads them about as the hen does her chickens: they begin to fly about the middle of August.
Both this and the great bustard are excellent eating, and, we should imagine, would well repay the trouble of domestication: indeed, it seems surprising that we should suffer these fine birds to run wild, and be in danger of total extinction, which, if properly cultivated, might afford as excellent a repast as our own domestic poultry, or even as the turkey, (vide Turkey) for which we are indebted to distant countries.—Bewick.
Butt, s. The place on which the mark to be shot at is placed; a vessel; a barrel containing one hundred and twenty-six gallons of wine; the thick or lower joint of a fishing rod; the handle of a cue.
The marks usually shot at by archers, for pastime, were “butts, prickes, and roavers.” The butt, we are told, was a level mark, and required a strong arrow, with a very broad feather; the pricke was a “mark of compass,” but certain in its distance; and to this mark strong swift arrows, of one flight, with a middling sized feather, were best suited; the roaver was a mark of uncertain lengths. It was, therefore, proper for the archer to have various kinds of arrows, of different weights, to be used according to the different changements made in the distance of the ground.
The Cornish men are spoken of as good archers, who shoot their arrows to a great length; they are also, says Carew, “well skilled in near shooting, and in well aimed shooting: the butts made them perfect in the one, and the roaving in the other, for the prickes, the first corrupters of archery, through too much preciseness, were formerly scarcely known, and little practised.” Other marks are occasionally mentioned; as the standard, the target, hazel wands, rose garlands, and the popinjay, which, we are told, was an artificial parrot.—Strutt.
Butt, v. To strike with the head.
Butter, s. An unctuous substance, made by agitating the cream of milk till the oil separates from the whey.
Butterfly, s. A beautiful insect.
Buttock, s. The rump, the part near the tail.