39 “Do you know when the mountain goats give birth?
    Do you observe the calving of the deer?
² Can you number the months that they fulfill,
    and do you know the time when they give birth,
³ when they crouch to give birth to their offspring,
    and are delivered of their young?
⁴ Their young ones become strong, they grow up in the open;
    they go forth, and do not return to them.

⁵ “Who has let the wild ass go free?
    Who has loosed the bonds of the swift ass,
⁶ to which I have given the steppe for its home,
    the salt land for its dwelling place?
⁷ It scorns the tumult of the city;
    it does not hear the shouts of the driver.
⁸ It ranges the mountains as its pasture,
    and it searches after every green thing.

⁹ “Is the wild ox willing to serve you?
    Will it spend the night at your crib?
¹⁰ Can you tie it in the furrow with ropes,
    or will it harrow the valleys after you?
¹¹ Will you depend on it because its strength is great,
    and will you hand over your labor to it?
¹² Do you have faith in it that it will return,
    and bring your grain to your threshing floor?

¹³ “The ostrich’s wings flap wildly,
    though its pinions lack plumage.
¹⁴ For it leaves its eggs to the earth,
    and lets them be warmed on the ground,
¹⁵ forgetting that a foot may crush them,
    and that a wild animal may trample them.
¹⁶ It deals cruelly with its young, as if they were not its own;
    though its labor should be in vain, yet it has no fear;
¹⁷ because God has made it forget wisdom,
    and given it no share in understanding.
¹⁸ When it spreads its plumes aloft,
    it laughs at the horse and its rider.