382 The Egyptian Vulture or Neophron 
There were no Griffons. about, which I accounted for by the fact 
that a pair of Golden Eagles were nesting in the big cliff just above. 
A pair of Neophrons had however taken possession and I was 
fortunate in being able to take a picture of their nest with my Goerz 
lens. | subsequently sent my party up the tree to inspect the nest 
and took a photograph of them at the moment the leading climber 
had reached it and was looking into it. I give the picture since it 
is eminently characteristic of the situations in which both Griffons 
and Neophrons most delight. 
Although I have seen some hundreds of Neophrons nests in all 
sorts of situations, some most inaccessible and others the reverse, 
it is only within the last few years that I have found them nesting 
practically on the ground. Twice, once in 1903 and once in 1907, 
have 1 come across nests built in a crevice amid big boulders on 
a hill side within a few feet of a mountain path! In each case the 
birds undoubtedly relied upon the remoteness of the situation and 
the fact that the path led nowhere save to a tract of grazing for goats 
and cattle. As shown in the picture on p. 383 a man standing on 
the rock in the centre can reach the nest in the small cavern just 
above it. The photograph is taken from the track. The fact that 
there are hundreds of similar valleys overgrown with giant heath 
and cistus and dotted with big grey rocks in all directions, all 
bewilderingly alike, no doubt influenced the birds in their choice of 
quarters. But when I recall the long days I have spent and the 
arduous climbs I have made when in quest of Neophron’s nests, 
such an example of a nesting station is a veritable veductio ad 
absurdum. 
The example of an Egyptian Vulture nesting in a tree which 
has been already alluded to is a curious one and well illustrative 
of the danger of generalizing on the habits of wild birds. Prior 
to finding this the description that this bird ‘invariably nests in 
cliffs’ was generally accepted. 
