There were six of them. When they caught sight of Tamina and Hugo, they ran towards them. Now bunched up and pressing against the fence, they stretched out their long necks, stared, and opened their straight, broad bills. They opened and closed them feverishly, with unbelievable speed, as if they were trying to outtalk one another. But those bills were hopelessly mute, making not the slightest sound.
The ostriches were like messengers who had learned an important message by heart but whose vocal cords had been cut by the enemy on the way; so that when they reached their destination, they could do no more than move their voiceless mouths.
[The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, Kundera, M.]
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