52 STORIES ABOUT BIRDS. 



discover carrion, will gorge tliemselves until 

 they can hardly stir, when they lie down and 

 sleep. A large dog, thns gorged, was sleeping 

 under a tree, when a John Crow descended upon 

 him, perhaps attracted by the smell of the car- 

 rion which the dog had been devouring, and 

 began tearing the muscles of the thigh. It 

 actually laid open a considerable space before 

 the poor animal was aroused by the pain, and 

 started up with a howl of agony. The wound 

 was dressed, but the dog soon died." " 



Yultures often follow hunters, in their excur- 

 sions after mid beasts. They hover at a little 

 distance; and when they see the beast flayed 

 and abandoned, they call out to each other, 

 pour down on the carcass, and, in an instant, 

 pick its bones as bare and clean as if they had 

 been scraped by a knife. 



At the Cape of Good Hope, in Africa, they 

 seem to display still greater dexterity in their 

 methods of carving. "I have," says Kolben, 

 been often a spectator of the manner in which 

 they have anatomized a dead body — I say 

 anatomized, for no artist in the world could 

 have done it more neatly. They have a won- 

 derful method of separating the flesh from the 

 bones, and yet leaving the skin quite entire. 

 Upon coming near the carcass, it Avould not be 



