THE HAWKS, EAGLES, KITES, AND VULTURES. 215 



Dr. A. K. Fisher showed sixty locusts and five other insects in 

 one, sixty-nine locusts and three other insects in another, and 

 seventy-five locusts in a third. Lizards were found in two 

 and a tree-frog in one. All contained insects — wasps, beetles, 

 and grasshoppers being among them. Aughey reports of 

 three stomachs that two of them contained sixty and sixty- 

 nine locusts respectively, while the third contained seventy- 

 five other insects. 



All the evidence tends to prove the swallow-tailed kite to 

 be harmless at least and generally beneficial. Two other 

 species, the white-tailed and Mississippi kites, have practically 

 the same bill of fare, which besides the animals above noted 

 is sometimes varied with snakes and mice. 



THE BUZZARDS. 



No birds are more familiarly known throughout the 

 Southern States than the Turkey-Buzzard and the Black 

 Vulture or Carrion Crow. These birds may be seen at all 

 hours of the day sailing through the air in majestic circles or 

 lazily resting on stumps or trees after a feast of their filthy 

 food. They perform an important service as scavengers, 

 disposing of all sorts of animal matter that would pollute the 

 air. On this account, they are seldom molested by man and 

 in some States are protected by law. They devour both 

 fresh and putrid meat, and in many localities save the butchers 

 the trouble of disposing of the refuse of the abattoir. They 

 are known sometimes to capture live snakes and to attack 

 helpless animals of many kinds. Along the sea-shore they 

 feed upon dead fish cast up by the waves, and Audubon re- 

 ports having observed them in the Florida Keys sucking the 

 eggs and devouring the young of herons and cormorants. As 

 another offset to the good these birds do, mention should be 

 made of the fact that Mr. E. B. Williamson has suggested 

 that they are " doubtless an important factor in the spread of 

 some diseases, — hog cholera, for example." 



