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a very intelligent and assiduous observer of tlie Ornithology of 

 California, and who has published, in the San Francisco Herald 

 of the 6th May, 1859, the following interesting account of 

 the nidification of this bii-d, which he calls the " Califomian 

 " Condor" : — " One of the rancheros of the Carmelo in hunting 

 among the highest peaks of the Santa Lucia range dui-ing the 

 last week of April, 1859, disturbed two Condors fi-om their 

 nests, and, at the great risk of breaking his neck, brought 

 away a young bird of six or seven days old, and also an egg; 

 the egg from one tree and the chick from another. There was, 

 properly speaking, no nest ; but the egg was laid in the hollow 

 of a tall old robles oak, in a steep baranca, near the summit of 

 one of the highest peaks, in the vicinity of the Tularcitos, near 

 a place called Conejos. The birds are said, by some himters, 

 not to make nests, but simply to lay their eggs on the ground 

 at the foot of old trees, or on the bare rocks of solitary peaks ; 

 others say they lay in old Eagles or Buzzards' nests ; while 

 some afiii-m they make nests of sticks and moss ; but the truth 

 seems to be they make no nests. The entire egg weighed ten 

 and a half ounces, and the contents eight and three quarter 

 ounces. The colour of the egg-shell is what painters call ' dead, 

 dull white' ; the sm-face of the shell is not glossy, but slightly 

 roughened, as in the Sea Pelican's eggs, but not so much. The 

 figure is very nearly a perfect elipse, being a model of form 

 and shape in itself. It measured four and a half inches in 

 length, by two and thi-ee-eight inches in breadth (diameter), 

 and was eight and three-quarters inches in circumference 

 around the middle. The egg-shell, after the contents were 

 emptied, (which were as clear, fine, bright, and inodorous 

 as those of a hen's egg, with a bright yellow yolk,) held as 

 much as nine fluid ounces of water. Before the egg was opened 

 it sunk on being placed in water, probably from its being very 

 recently impregnated. Some of the old hunters say the egg is 

 excellent eating; this one certainly had not the faintest musky 

 odour, nor the slightest foreign smell. The young Condor 



