ILLUSTRATIONS (2). THE CONDOB. 239 



moving along a black rocky precipice on the volcano of 

 Pichincha. Lightning conductors, being thin elongated 

 objects, are visible, as Arago has observed, from the greatest 

 distances and under the smallest angles. 



The account I have given in my Monograph of the Condor 

 (Zoologie, pp. 26 — 45) of the habits of this powerful bird in the 

 mountain districts of Quito and Peru has been confirmed by a 

 more recent traveller, Gay, who has explored the whole of 

 Chili, and described it in his admirable work, Historia Jisica y 

 politica de Chile. This bird which, singularly enough, like 

 the Lamas, Vicunas, Alpacas and Guanacos, is not found be- 

 yond the equator in New Granada, penetrates as far south as 

 the Straits of Magellan. In Chili, as in the elevated plateaux 

 of Quito, the Condors, which usually live in pairs, or even 

 alone, congregate in flocks for the purpose of attacking 

 lambs and calves, or seizing on young Guanacos (Guanacillos). 

 The havoc annually committed by the Condor among the herds 

 of sheep, goats and cattle, as well as among the wild vicunas, 

 alpacas and guanacos of the chain of the Andes is very con- 

 siderable. The Chilians assert that this bird when in captivity 

 can endure hunger for forty days; when in a free state,, 

 however, its voracity is excessive, and it then, like the 

 vulture, feeds by preference on carrion. 



The mode of catching these birds, by an inclosure of pali- 

 sades such as I have already described, is as successful in 

 Chili as in Peru, for the bird after being rendered heavy from 

 excess of food is obliged to run a short distance with half- 

 extended wings before it can take flight. A dead ox which 

 is already in an incipient state of decomposition, is strongly 

 inclosed with palisades, within which narrow space the 

 Condors throng together; being unable, as already observed, 

 to fly on account of the excess of food which they have de- 

 voured, and impeded in their run by the palisades, these birds 

 are either killed by the natives with clubs, or are caught alive 

 by the lasso. The Condor was represented as a symbol of 

 strength on the coinage of Chili immediately after the first 

 declaration of political independence.^ 



The different species of Gallinazos, which are much more 

 considerable in point of numbers than the Condors, are also 



* Claudio Gay, Historia Jisica y politica cle Chile, publicada bajo 

 los auspicios del Supremo Gobierno; Zoologia, pp. 194 — 198. 



