1O16 VULTURE 
the Ancient Continent, equal in rank to the Falconidx, while fully 
admitting the claim made on behalf of the New-World forms for 
the same standing. 
I. The American Vultures include five genera: —(1) Sarcorhamphus, 
the gigantic Conpor (p. 101), the male distinguished by a large 
fleshy comb and wattles; (2) Gypagus, the King-Vulture, with its 
gaudily-coloured head and nasal caruncle ; (3) Catharista, generally 
known as the Black Vulture or “Carrion Crow,” C. atrata, of the 
warmer parts of America; (4) Cathartes, containing the so-called 
JOHN Crow (p. 470), or Turkey-Buzzard of English - speaking 
Americans, with its allies ;1 and (5) Pseudogryphus, the great Cali- 
fornian Vulture—of very limited range on the western slopes of 
North America and, through the use of poison, threatened with 
speedy extinction. Though all these birds are structurally so 
different from the true Vultures of the Old World, in habits the 
Vulturidz and Sarcorhamphide are much alike, and of several of the 
latter—particularly of the Condor and the Turkey-Buzzard— 
we possess elaborate accounts by excellent observers, as Darwin, 
Alexander Wilson and Gosse—whose works are readily accessible. 
II. The true Vultures of the Old World, Vultwride in the 
restricted sense, are generally divided into five or six genera, of 
which NEOPHRON (p. 621) has been not unjustifiably separated as 
forming a distinct subfamily, Neophroniny,—its members, of com- 
paratively small size, differing both in structure and habit consider- 
ably from the rest. One of them is the so-called Egyptian Vulture 
or Pharaoh’s Hen, N. perenopterus, a bird whose delicacy of build and 
appearance contrasts forcibly with its choice of the most filthy food. 
It is a well-known species in some parts of India,? and thence west- 
ward to Africa, where it has an extensive range. It also occurs on 
the northern shores of the Mediterranean, and on three occasions 
has strayed to such a distance from its usual haunts as to have 
twice suffered capture in England, and once even in Norway. Of 
the genera composing the other subfamily, Vulturine, space is want- 
ing to say much. Gyps numbers seven or eight local species and 
races, on more than one of which the English name GRIFFON (p. 
385) has been fastened. The best known is G. fulvus, which by 
some authors is accounted “ British,” from an example having been 
taken in Ireland, though in circumstances which suggest its appear- 
ance so far from its nearest home in Spain to be due to man’s 
intervention. The species, however, has a wider distribution on 
the European continent (especially towards the north-east) than the 
1 The birds of these two genera are easily to be distinguished on the wing 
at a considerable distance (ef. Coues, B. North West, pp. 381, 382). 
2 In the eastern part of the Indian peninsula it is replaced by a smaller race 
or (according to some authorities) species, W. gingianus, which has a yellow 
instead of a black bill. 
