EXPERIENCES WITH EAGLES AND VULTURES. 211 



Eventually, after dragging the lame beasts some twenty 

 miles, we got clear of the sierra, but found that our 

 absence had caused much anxiety at Jerez. On the out- 

 ward ride, it had so chanced, we were present at a sad 

 accident by which two men and their nine mules lost their 

 lives, while attempting to cross the swollen Guadalete at 

 the Barca Florida. Consequently we did not attempt the 

 ford, and only reached the sierra after a long detour : but 

 news of the accident having reached Jerez, and our dis- 

 appearance being unluckily attributed thereto, the curious 

 result was that the first person we met on the v&ia of 

 Guadalete was honest old Bias, all solemn and dejected, as 

 he endeavoured, by watching the flight of the vultures, to 

 discover our remains ! 



The beautiful crags of Zurita and the Agredera impend- 

 ing our historic Guadalete, and lying about a dozen miles 

 from Jerez, are a favourite spring ride. In April their 

 lower slopes are resplendent with acres of rhododendrons 

 Just bursting into bloom, crimson peonies peep from arid 

 nooks, and the riverside is fringed with laurestinus and 

 myrtle, oleanders, sallows and palmetto, all resonant with 

 the melody of nightingales. To these crags the Neophron, 

 or Egyptian Vulture, yearly resorts, and six or eight nests 

 may be found in a daj^'s ramble, all placed in holes or 

 fissures of the cliff, which, from its rottenness and over- 

 hung form, is far from easy to scale. Nor is a Neophron's 

 eyry a very delectable spot when reached ; for, hand- 

 some as he looks on wing, this vulture is one of the 

 foulest of feeders. The stench at his abode is over- 

 powering ; all around lies carrion in every stage of cor- 

 ruption, while swarms of loathsome flies rise and buzz 

 heavily around the intruder. The nest itself is made of 

 rags and wool — no sticks — and the two eggs, often as 

 richly coloured as a Peregrine's, are laid early in April. 

 Though the food of the Neophron is mostly bones, ordure, 

 and garbage, yet it will, exceptionally, take living creatures ; 

 a male, shot on April 19th, when returning to his nest, 

 carried in his beak the yet writhing remains of a small 

 snake. In a rather low part of this range of crags (its 



