?46 THE FACULTY OF SCENT IN THE VULTURE. 



minutely. If the Vultur aura, which, as I have said above, I have 

 never seen to prey upon living animals, be directed by its eye alone 

 to the object of its food, by what means can it distinguish a dead 

 animal from an animal asleep? or how is it to know a newly dead 

 lizard or a snake, from, a lizard or a snake basking quite motionless 

 in the sun? If its eye be the director to its food, what blunders 

 must it not make in the negro-yards in Demerara, where broods of 

 ducks and fowls are always to be found the day through, either 

 sleeping or basking in the open air. Still the negro, whom habit has 

 taught to know the Vultur aura from a hawk, does not consider 

 him an enemy. But let a hawk approach the negro-yard, all will be 

 .in commotion, and the yells of the old women will be tremendous. 

 Were you to kill a fowl and place it in the yard with the live ones, 

 it would remain there unnoticed by the vulture as long as it was 

 sweet ; but, as soon as it became offensive, you would see the Vultur 

 aura approach it, and begin to feed upon it, or carry it away, with- 

 out showing any inclination to molest the other fowls which might 

 be basking in the neighbourhood. When I carried Lord Colling- 

 wood's despatches up the Orinoco, to the city of Angustura, I there 

 saw the common vultures of Guiana nearly as tame as turkeys. The 

 Spaniards protected them, and considered them in the light of useful 

 scavengers. Though they were flying about the city in all directions, 

 and at times perching upon the tops of the houses, still many of the 

 people, young and old, took their siesta in the open air, "their 

 custom always of the afternoon," and had no fear of being ripped up 

 and devoured by the surrounding vultures. If the vulture has no 

 extraordinary powers of smelling, which faculty, I am told, is now 

 supposed to be exploded since the appearance of the article in 

 Jamesorf s Journal, I marvel to learn how these birds in Angustura 

 got their information that the seemingly lifeless bodies of the 

 Spaniards were merely asleep, 



" Dulcis et alta quies, placidseque simillima morti," 



and were by no means proper food for them. Some years 

 after this, being alongside of a wood, I saw a negro on the 

 ground ; and, as I looked at him from a distance, it struck me that 

 all was not right with him. On going up to him I found him 



