STORIES ABOUT BIRDS. 



it from where he is hovering high up over the nest, on purpose to break the 

 eggs. Then down he comes, and feasts upon them to his heart's content. 



The tawny goose vultures are met with in ahnost every part of Africa, 

 and are very tame. They have the useful habits of their tribe, and clear 

 away rubbish in a very short space of time. 



THE CONDOR. 



The grandest of all the birds of prey is the condor. He can soar higher 

 than the eagle, and though he belongs to the tribe of vultures, that are an 

 inferior race to the king of birds, yet he excels him in size, in strength, and 

 in fierceness. Indeed, none in the whole family of birds can compare or 

 compete with him. 



The size of the condor is immense. When the wings are spread out they 

 measure as much as twelve or fourteen feet across. 



He loves the mountain ranges of the Andes ; and here the solitary traveller 

 often sees him, soaring aloft until he becomes a mere speck, and entering a 

 region where man could not breathe the rarefied air. 



At night the condor rests on the ledges of the rock ; and when the sun 

 gilds the mountain tops, and while it is yet dark in the vaHeys, he rouses 

 himself, flaps his wings, and peers over the ledge into the abyss below ; then 

 he dives over, and seems as if sinking by the great weight of his body ; but 

 soon he rises, and begins to move upwards in sweeping circles, until he 

 ascends often as much as four miles above the level of the sea. 



By-and-by he descends to the shore, and his loud screech is heard with 

 the dashing of the surf When hovering in the air he will spy out his prey in 

 the valley below. Sometimes it is a lamb, or a sheep, or a mule that has 

 fallen dead on the mountains. 



True to his nature as a vulture, he will not reject dead prey, but he is 

 equally glad of it even when alive. 



His talons cannot clutch the prey as do those of the eagle, and he does 



