At Manila one object after another would be continually presenting
itself to our notice, leading the thoughts into the still remote parts
of the eastern world. In the yard of a gentleman stood this singular
creature, which you felt obliged to call a bird yet you would prefer
that it should be classed as an animal, for it seemed to belong among
animals, though it is a biped. Its enormous legs, eighteen inches long,
its fleshy protuberance on its head, coarsely imitating the tuft on
the head of the peacock, left you in doubt how to assign it a place
among the tribes of the animal kingdom, reminding you of the exploit
in rhyming which a wit perpetrated with its name and its place of
nativity, making Cassowary to rhyme with ‘missionary,’ and Timbuctoo
with ‘hymn-book too.’