GRIFFON-VULTURE. O 



several races, if not distinct species, have been confounded 

 under the name of Gyj^s or Vulturfidvus, and in particular 

 that which inhabits Spain and the north-western portion of 

 Africa, has received the name of Gyps occidcntalis. Mr. 

 Blyth, however, has remarked that a specimen which he 

 received under this designation from Algeria, was simply a 

 female of Gyps fulvus, for in the Vultur'uhe, unlike the 

 other birds of prey, that sex is always the smaller. 



Of late years the habits of this Vulture have been closely 

 observed by many of those oi*nithologists whom a spirit of 

 inquiry, possibly engendered by the earlier editions of this 

 work, has prompted to wander far from home in the pursuit of 

 the study to which they are devoted, and there are probably 

 few exotic birds about which more has been written than the 

 Griffon-Vulture. Its manners have been examined by these 

 adventurous naturalists in very many of its haunts, and it 

 is difficult to select from their accounts, chiefly published in 

 ' The Ibis,' the passages most worthy of citation, where all 

 are of interest. Since the presumption, however, is that the 

 bird taken in Ireland, as above mentioned, was of the 

 western race, it may be advisable to restrict the extracts to 

 remarks which can only refer to that form. 



In Algeria, Canon Tristram mentions that on the occasion 

 of a Camel being slaughtered in the Desert, which the 

 Griifon-Vulture does not habitually frequent, it was not till 

 the next morning that a bird scented, or rather descried, the 

 prey. " That the Vulture uses," he continues (Ibis, 1859, 

 p. 280), "the organ of sight rather than that of smell, seems 

 to be certain from the immense height at which he soars 

 and gyrates in the air. In this instance one solitary bird 

 descended, and half an hour afterwards was joined by a 

 second. A short time elapsed, and the Nubian Vulture 

 {Ofogyps nubicus) appeared, self-invited, at the feast; and 

 before the bones were left to the Hyrena, no less than nine 



Griffons and two Nubians had broken their fast 



May we not conjecture that the process is as follows ? — The 

 Griffon who first descries his quarry, descends from his 

 elevation at once. Another, sweeping the horizon at a still 



