THE FULVOUS VULTURE. 



283 



and the eye, and close by the ear, there is a part which has a fine sil- 

 very-blue appearance. Just above the white spot a portion of the skin 

 is blue, and the rest scarlet ; the skin which juts out behind the neck, 

 and appears like an oblong carbuncle, is blue in part, and part orange. 

 The bill is orange and black, the caruncles on the forehead orange, and 

 the cere orange, the orbits scarlet, and the irides white." 



These gorgeous tints belong only to the adult bird of four years old, 

 and in the previous years of its life the colors are very obscure. In 

 the first year, for example, the general color is deep blue-gray, the ab- 

 domen white, and the crest hardly distinguishable for eitlier its color 

 or its size. In the second year of its age the plumage of the bird is 

 nearly black, diversified with white spots, and the naked portions of 

 the head and neck are violet-black interspersed with a few dashes of 

 yellow. The third year gives the bird a very near approach to the 

 beautiful satin fawn of the adult plumage, the back being of nearly 

 the same hue as that of the four-year-old bird, but marked with many 

 of the blue-black feath- 

 ers of the second year. 

 When full grown, the 

 King Vulture is about 

 the size of an ordinary 

 goose. 



The Fulvous or 

 Griffin Vulture is 

 one of the most familiar 

 of these useful birds, 

 being spread widely 

 over nearly the whole 

 of the Old World, and 

 found in very many por- 

 tions of Europe, Asia, 

 and Africa. 



It is one of the large 

 Vultures, measuring 

 four feet in length, and 

 its expanse of wing be- 

 ing exceedingly wide. 

 Like many of its rela- 

 tions, it is a high-roving 

 bird, loving to rise out 

 of the ken of ordinary eyes, and from that vast elevation to view the 

 panorama which lies beneath its gaze — not, however, for the purpose 

 of admiring the beauty of the prospect, but for the more sensual object 

 of seeking for food. Whenever it has discovered a dead or dying an- 



The Fulvous or Griffin Vulture ( Gyps fulms). 



