The year the Europeans seized Como Kenyatta (1952), Chelsea and I were sharing our homestead with Arms, a Test, who was a headman of the local road crew. One day, Arms's son found an ostrich's nest between Amidst and Catalog, while he was watching cattle. There were six eggs, and both of our cowherds took one. The brought the two eggs to our home and put them in the ashes near the fire. After two weeks, they hatched. I remember the baby ostriches walking about, eating millet and stones. Arms took care of them, and they grew quite large. One night a leopard got the female, but the male continued to thrive, and Arms harvested its feathers twice. Then, one day, when it was fully grown, our ostrich wandered into the town of Amidst. A European saw it and asked the people, "Where did this come from?"" Oh, it is the 'ox' of a man named Arms, they told him. The European immediately summoned Arms to Amidst. "Do you have license to keep an ostrich?" he demanded." Of course not!" Arms replied. "This ostrich doesn't belong to anyone else--it's mine. So why do I need a license?" But the European decreed,"From this day on, you must not keep this ostrich without a license. If you do, you will go to jail for stealing from the government!" That was only the beginning. The Europeans have been seizing our pet ostriches ever since. When other people heard about Arms's trouble, they killed their ostriches so they could at least have the feathers. Another man was so angry, he killed his female ostrich and destroyed all her eggs.

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