THE

WILTSHIRE MAGAZINE.

66 MULTORUM MANIBUS GRANDE LEVATUR ONUS."-Ovid.

Che Great Bustard.

(Otis tarda.)

In recording the circumstances of the recent capture of a fine male specimen of this most noble bird, on the borders of Wiltshire, (of which the accompanying woodcut is a portrait,) I propose to preface that account with some particulars of the habits of the species, and enter into some enquiry as to its former abundance or scarcity, believing as I do, that every fact is valuable which relates to so exceedingly interesting a bird, now alas! for a long time extinct as a resident throughout the kingdom, and only rarely and after an interval of several years, seen as a straggler. And the evidence which I shall adduce will be derived, in the first place, from former writers on the subject, especially Yarrell's most valuable work, and an exceedingly interesting paper on the Great Bustard, which appeared in a recent number of Frazer's Magazine, (September, 1854), supposed to be from the pen of the Rev. Charles Barham; and, in the second place, from facts which I have gleaned during several years, after diligent enquiries instituted by myself, and through others, of old shepherds, farmers, &c, who can recollect, when boys, seeing this bird in its wild state on our Downs, but which eye-witnesses are daily becoming fewer, and their memories of things so long passed away, more and more confused.

The Great Bustard (Otis tarda,) belongs to the Order of "Ground birds" (Rasores,) and to the Family Struthionida; and it is the largest of the British land birds: its bill is nearly straight, and with the point of the upper mandible curved; its legs long, and

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naked above the knee, very muscular and strong; its toes three only in number, and these very short, united at the base, and all directed forwards; its wings of mean length, but also muscular. A full grown male, if in good condition, will weigh 28lbs, and measure three feet nine inches in length: its general plumage is as follows-head and neck, bluish grey; back and tail coverts, buff orange, barred and spotted with black; upper part of the breast reddish orange; all the under parts white: the adult male is also furnished with long wiry feathers, depending laterally from the chin, and moustaches of the same; the female, which is only about one third in size as compared with the other sex, has no lateral chin feathers or moustaches, and her head and neck are of a deeper grey, but in other respects her plumage is similar to that of the male. Of large and bulky form, but with powerful wings as well as legs, it is enabled to fly as well as to run with considerable speed and endurance; it never perches at all; it is of a roving disposition, and loves vast open plains, amidst the long coarse grass of which, and the fields of corn, and thick gorse, it delights to dwell, and it will also frequent marshy ground, where such tracts are to be found near its favorite haunts. Its food consists chiefly of herbage and grain, such as rye and barley, stalks as well as ears; and insects such as beetles; but reptiles and the smaller mammalia are said to be devoured by this omnivorous bird. It is polygamous, and the males separate from the females at the period of incubation, leaving them to lay their two eggs on the bare ground, and rear their young alone; but they all unite in flocks as autumn approaches, and during deep and continued snows are sometimes driven from their open plains to more sheltered and enclosed districts; they are exceedingly bold and pugnacious, sometimes attacking those who come near them with most determined ferocity; they are at the same time very wild and difficult to approach, so that sportsmen were accustomed to mask their advance, as they do at this day in Spain, by means of a stalking horse. When in repose, bustards usually rest with one leg drawn up, and with head reclining backwards on the neck; when seen at a distance, Gilbert White said they resembled "fallow deer," a fact corroborated by Mr. Wolley, who

saw them in Spain, apparently walking in file, some with their heads down, as he was ascending the Guadalquiver in a steam-boat. When they take wing, they generally rise to a considerable height above the ground, and will fly often at an elevation of one hundred feet, with a regular, but by no means slow flap of the wings, for two miles or more before they alight again. As both in flight and in running its speed is remarkable, naturalists have been much puzzled to account for the specific names assigned to it, as the universal scientific name "tarda," and by the French "outarde," and by the Spanish "abutarda." In the paper above alluded to in Frazer's Magazine, Albertus is quoted, as accounting for these specific names, thus, "Bistarda avis est bis vel ter saltum dans, priusquam de humo elevetur, unde et eis nomen factum," and this alleged habit of the bird, giving two or three leaps before it rises from the ground, and thus recalling the action of ascending a staircase, is mentioned as being likewise the origin of its German name "Trapp-gans," whence also the quaint distich

"The big-boaned Bustard then, whose body beares that size,

That he against the wind must runne, ere he can rise."

Such then being the habits of the bird, I proceed to its history; and here we can trace it back to very remote times, its form appearing among the Egyptian hieroglyphics, and many well-known ancient writers having thought it not unworthy of mention. Athenæus, Plutarch, Elian, Oppian, Xenophon, Aristotle, and Pliny, are some of those who have described it, and though much fable is mixed up with their accounts, the description is sufficiently clear to enable us to identify the bird. But to pass on from these bustards of ancient Greece and Asia, to those of ancient Britain, when the Druids were in full force, and held their mystic rites at Avebury and Stonehenge, then this bird flourished on the unbroken down, and abounded in the unreclaimed wastes throughout this county; its name was "Yr araf ehedydd," but to what extent it abounded, or how far it was looked upon as game, or how much it was the object of pursuit in those days of flint arrow-heads, does not so clearly appear. To come down, however, to a much later period, from the earliest records we have of it in comparatively