This bird was not sacred among the ancient Egyptians, but there is reason to believe that it was so with the Assyrians. It has not only been found as an ornament on the robes of figures in the most ancient edifices at Nimroud, but it was frequently introduced on Babylonian and Assyrian cylinders, always accompanied by the emblematical flower. The Romans appear to have regarded it as a delicacy, for Apicius left a receipt for a particular sauce for dressing it; and it is recorded of Heliogabalus, that he had the brains of six hundred of these birds served up as a dish at one of his feasts. But in trencher feats the pseudo-emperor Formius far outdid either, as it is related by Vopiscus, that be devoured a whole ostrich to his own share at a single sitting. It was broadly asserted by Aristotle, that the ostrich was partly bird and partly quadruped; and by Pliny, that it might almost be said to belong to the class of beasts; ridiculous as such assertions might be supposed, they were not altogether without foundation according to the knowledge of the times. The common name by which the ostrich was designated by the Greeks and Romans, and also by the nations of the East, was the _camel bird_. Indeed, the total want of feathers on its long and very powerful legs, and the division of the feet into two toes only, connected at their base by a membrane, are very similar to the legs and long, divided hoof of the camel: nor does the resemblance cease here, for there is another singularity in their external conformation, which affords a still more remarkable coincidence. Both camel and ostrich are furnished with hard, callous protuberances on the chest, and on the posterior part of the abdomen, on which they support themselves when at rest, and they both lie down in the same manner, by first bending their knees, then applying the anterior callosity, and lastly the posterior, to the ground. When to this we add the patience of thirst of both, and their inhabiting the same arid deserts, the two may well be compared with each other. The ostrich is altogether destitute of the power of flight, and accordingly the wings are reduced to a very low state of development, merely sufficient, in fact, to aid it when running at speed. The sharp keel of the breast-bone, which, in birds of rapid flight, affords an extensive surface for the attachment of the muscles moving the wings, is not required, and the surface of the bone is therefore flat, like that of a quadruped, but the muscles of the legs are of extraordinary magnitude.