6 NORTH AMERICAN OOLOGY. PART I. 



following measurements: Srg- inches by Iff; 3 by 2^-; 3r by Iff. The prin- 

 cipal difference between the eggs of this and the preceding species is in regard to 

 their size. Their ground color is the same, or nearly the same : a yellowish-white 

 or cream-color, almost never a pure white, and if so, only in exceptional cases. The 

 eggs are more elongate in their shape, and the blotches are usually larger. These 

 are of a dark reddish-brown, confluent and chiefly distributed around the larger end. 

 There are also markings or dashes, smaller and less frequent, of lilac and purplish 

 drab, similar to those noticed in the eggs of the C. aura. An egg from the Bio 

 Grande is marked with small spots of reddish-brown and faint lilac, equally dis- 

 tributed over the whole surface on a ground of cream-color. This is very pecu- 

 liar, and probably not a common variation from the more usual markings of the 

 eggs of this Vulture. The more common markings of this egg are well represented 

 in fig. 3. The specimen was obtained by Audubon on Galveston Island, Texas. 

 Fig. 4 represents a less common variety, obtained by Dr. Kollock in Cheraw, S. C. 



CATIIARTES CALIFORNIANUS. 



Vullur californianus, SHAW, Nat. Misc. IX, 1797, 1, pi. ccci. 

 Vultur columbianus, ORD, Outline's Geog. II, 1815, 315. 

 Cathartes vulturinus, TEMM. PI. Col. I, 1820, pi. xxxi. 

 Cathartes californianus, BONAP. Syn. 1828, p. 22. 



NUTTALL, Manual, I, 1832, p. 39. 



" AUD. Orn. Blog. V, 1838, 240, pi. ccccxi. 



BONAP. Geog. and Comp. List, 1838, p. 1. 

 AUD. Syn. 1839, p. 2. 



" Birds of Am. (8vo.) I, 1840, 12, pi. i. 

 GRAY, Gen. of Birds, 1849, pi. ii. 



CASSIN, Syn. N. A. Birds (Illust. Birds of Cal.), 1854, p. 58. 

 VULG. The Calif ornian Vulture. The California Turkey- Buzzard. 



BUT one instance of the possession of a well-authenticated egg of this species by 

 a naturalist has come to my knowledge. This was one laid in confinement by a 

 female belonging to the Garden of Plants in Paris. An accurate drawing of this 

 was taken by Dr. James Trudeau, and is now in my possession. There seems no 

 reason to doubt that the egg thus laid does not essentially vary from those depos- 

 ited hi a wild state. It certainly is hardly possible that the variations between this 

 and the natural egg can be so total and striking, as between it and the attributed 



degree of development possessed by the young bird when first hatched. Birds whose young are hatched 

 in an advanced stage of maturity, and can shift for themselves from the egg, like many species of 

 shore-birds, the Urice and others, have invariably proportionately very large eggs, and vice versa, except 

 only where the female deposits a large number, as in the case of the Wild Turkey, the Virginia Quail, 

 the Ruffed Grouse, and many others. 



