122 LLOYDS NATURAL HISTORY. 



though the bulk of the migration takes place in March, the 

 laying of the eggs taking place about the ist of May. 



The food of the present species consists of all kinds of 

 carrion, dung, and putrefying substances of all sorts. It will 

 take its meal from a carcase after the Hyaenas and Griffons 

 have had their share, and even frequents the sea-shore to 

 pick up rotten fish thrown up by the tide. Though repul- 

 sive in its habits, everyone admits that the Neophron is a 

 fine bird on the wing. In the Himalayas I found the Indian 

 representative of the genus inhabiting the lower valleys, where 

 they sailed majestically backwards and forwards, scanning the 

 ground below. At Simla they never ascended to the higher 

 portions of the mountains, where the Griffons were to be seen 

 topping the crest in the early morning on their far-reaching 

 course, but hundreds of feet down below one could see the 

 White Scavengers sailing in the valley in circles or in a direct 

 line. 



From their habits one can gather the idea of what their nest 

 may be like. Here is the description given by that excellent 

 observer. Colonel Irby, in his work on the " Ornithology of 

 the Straits of Gibraltar " : — " The nest is often easily accessible 

 from below, and, placed on a ledge of some overhung rock, 

 generally at the top of a sierra, is composed of a few dead 

 sticks, always lined with wool, rags, and rubbish, such as a 

 dog's head, boars' tusks, dead kittens, foxes' skulls and fur, 

 rotten hedge-hogs, dead toads, dead snakes, skeletons of 

 snakes, lizards, mummified lizards, lizards' heads, carapaces 

 of the water-tortoise, rotten fish, excrement both of man and 

 beast, bones, bits of rope and paper. In one nest Major 

 Verner found, among a heap of filthy rags, a number of meal- 

 worms. Probably the Neophron had picked up a bag with 

 some flour in it. Naturally, from the above-mentioned con- 

 tents, their nests are most offensively odoriferous ! " He 

 further adds : — " They are probably among the foulest feeding 

 birds that live, and are very omnivorous, devouring any animal 

 substance, even all sorts of excrement : nothing comes amiss 

 to them." 



Nest. — A mass of sticks and rubbish, as described above. 

 As a rule in Southern Europe, the nest is placed on the ledge 



