BEASTS AND BIRDS OF PREY. 



693 



CHAPTER XIV. 



TROPICAL BEASTS AND BIRDS OF PREY. 



Variety of Carnivorous Creatures. — Birds of Prey : Tlie Condor — His Marvelous Flight His 



Cowardice — Modes of Capturing them — The Turkey -Buzzard, or Carrion Vulture — The 

 King of the Vultures — The Urubu — Capable of Domestication — The Ilarpy Eagle — 

 The Sociable Vulture — The Bacha — The Fishing Eagle — The Musical Sparrow-Hawk — 

 Tlie Secretary Eagle.^ZJeaste of Preij : The Lion — Fictitious Character ascribed to him 

 — Mode of Seizing his Prey — Lions and Giraffe — Lion and Hottentot — Andersson and a 

 Lion — Livingstone's narrow Escape — Lion-Hunting in the Atlas — By the Bushmen — Cap- 

 turing their Young — Former and present Range of the Lion — Lion and Rhinoceros — 

 Livingstone's Estimate of the Lion — The Tiger — Their Ravages in Java — Wide Range of 

 the Tiger — Tiger-Hunting in India — Escape from a Tiger — Animals announcing the Ap- 

 proach of a Tiger — Turtle-hunting Tigers — The Panther and Leopard — The Cheetah — 

 The Hyena — The Spotted and Brown Hyenas — The Felida; of New World — The Jaguar 

 — Hunting the Jaguar — The Cougar, or Puma — The Ocelot — The Jaguarandi — The 

 Tiger-Cat. 



ALMOST all birds and a considerable proportion of animals are carnivorous, and 

 notwithstanding their differences in size, may be strictly designated as Birds 

 and Beasts of Prey. The fox and weasel are as strictly beasts of prey as the lion and 

 the tiger ; the sparrow and robin, although seeds and fruit form part of their food, are as 

 truly birds of prey as the eagle and the vulture. A sparrow will, indeed, in the course, 

 of a single day, probably destroy more individual living creatures than an eagle will 

 in his whole life-time ; a fox in a year more than a lion in the half century which he 

 is supposed to live. We shall here, however, confine ourselves wholly to the larger 

 species of birds and beasts of prey, commencing with the former. 



The flight of the Condor is truly wonderful. From the mountain-plains of the 

 Andes, the royal bird, soaring aloft, appears only like a small black speck on the sky, 

 and a few hours afterwards he descends to the coast and mixes his loud screech with 

 the roar of the surf. No living creature rises voluntarily so high, none traverses in 

 so short a time all the climates of the globe. He rests at night in the crevices of the 

 rocks, or on some jutting ledge ; but as soon as the first rays of the sun light the 

 summits of the mountains, while the darkness of night still rests upon the deeper 

 valleys, he stretches forth his neck, shakes his head as if fully to rouse himself, stoops 

 over the brink of the abyss, and flapping his wings, dives into the aerial ocean. At 

 first his flight is by no means strong ; he sinks as if borne down by his weight, but 

 soon he ascends, and sweeps through the rarified atmosphere without any perceptible 

 vibratory motion of the wings. " Near Lima," says Mr. Darwin, " I watched several 

 condors for nearly half an hour without once taking off my eyes. They moved in 

 large curves, sweeping in circles, descending and ascending without once flapping. 



