38 ANIMAL LIFE IN AFRICA 



the air becomes clear, they leave the leafless bough which 

 has been their night lodging and circle far up, until, 

 from being a mere speck in the sky, they are finally lost 

 to the view of the naked eye altogether. They are 

 solitary in their watch for food, and each bird floats 

 about quartering his own patch of the heavens, until his 

 .amazingly keen sight indicates to him the presence of a 

 dead animal, when he sweeps straight down in a long 

 inclined plane. Seeing him drop, his nearest companions 

 on right and left follow suit, and the signal is taken up 

 until every vulture for many miles around is gathered 

 to the feast. 



The old theory that vultures hunted by scent, which 

 found a staunch supporter in an eminent naturalist 

 of the middle of the past century, has been discredited 

 by later observation, and it is now universally held that 

 it is their keen sight alone which tells them the whereabouts 

 of their food. I think no one who has seen vultures drop 

 in scores from extreme altitudes within a few minutes of 

 an animal having been killed, can doubt this for a moment. 

 After two occasions on which I had happened to shoot 

 crocodiles basking on sandbanks, stone dead with the 

 first shot, so that they lay in perfectly natural positions, 

 I took the trouble to visit the carcasses every day,in order 

 to see what the vultures did On one occasion it was a 

 week, and on the other five days, before any birds came 

 near ; though as many minutes would barely have 

 elapsed in the case of a mammal lying obviously dead in 

 the bush ere they put in an appearance. A dead animal 

 well covered up with branches is also quite safe from 

 vultures ; and the leopard, in placing his kill up a tree, 

 probably has these birds, as well as four-footed scavengers, 

 in mind. 



It is doubtful how far, if at all, any birds are served 



