44 PONDS, PADDOCKS, AND AVIARIES 



every loafer with a gun will very naturally shoot every 

 feathered thing that offers him a chance. 



" Mr. Cosgrave,* my chief in charge of the Lilford 

 collections, assures me that the birds that afford, perhaps, 

 most amusement to our numerous visitors are a black 

 and a griffon vulture, that have been here since 1865 

 and 1 867, and were both taken in my presence from 

 their respective nests in Spain. The former bird is a 

 female, and for the last twelve or thirteen years has 

 annually made a large nest and laid from one to 

 three eggs. Since the griffon (of whose sex I am 

 uncertain) has been in the same compartment with this 

 black vulture, it has annually taken a share in making 

 the nest, and displayed quite equal ferocity on the 

 approach of human visitors. The first egg is generally 

 laid during the first week of March. As I considered the 

 pairing of these two birds, though extremely improbable, 

 as not entirely impossible, I have once or twice left the 

 eggs in the nest, but although assiduously incubated by 

 both birds, they have invariably proved infertile. How- 

 ever, for months after the eggs have been removed, the 

 black vulture, when any one approaches the front of the 



* Clementina Lady Lilford writes : " Richard Cosgrave entered 

 Lord Lilford's service as falconer and keeper of the aviaries in 

 November 1893. His intelligence and his interest in birds, increa.sed 

 by constant friendly intercourse with, and instruction from Lord 

 Lilford, soon made him a most valuable and reliable assistant, 

 and one whose unfailing devotion and trustworthiness were deeply 

 appreciated by his employer." 



