FAMILY D I U R N A . DIURNAL. 



59 



so long as a morsel of flesh remains, 

 gorging itself so completely, that, if 

 disturbed soon after its meal, it is in- 

 capable of rising till it has ejected the 

 contents of its crop. 



The Indian Vulture (V. Indus), about 

 three feet and three inches in length, or 

 about the size of a turkey. Kolbe's 

 Vulture (V. Kolbii), rather less than 

 V. Auricularis, is a native of Africa, 

 India, and Java ; and the Angda Vul- 

 ture (V. Angolensis), native of the 

 western and northern parts of Africa. Griffon Vulture. 



The Hooded or Monk Vulture (V. Galericulatus), shown on Plate 1, 

 is two feet five inches in length ; beak yellow ; its cere blue ; naked parts 

 of the head and neck red, rosy, or white, according to the quantity of blood 

 sent to the skin ; neck, back, scapulars, and belly pure white, often inter- 

 spersed with a few tawny feathers ; the collar of white feathers, separating 

 the neck from the chest, and rising upon the back, forms a sort of mantle 

 or hood of greater height than in the other species ; general colour of the 

 plumage blackish-brown : is a native of the western and northern parts of 

 Africa. 



SARCORAMPHUS Condor. This genus is one of a distinct character, 

 remarkable for their feeble snorting voice, caused by the absence of tracheal 

 muscles. The bird figured on Plate 1 the King Vulture (Sarcoramphus 

 Papa) is the most beautiful, although one of the smallest of the family of 

 Vultures, being only about the size of a goose. Its dignified title is one 

 of comparison, having been given to it from the fact that the Gallinagos, 

 with which it is allied hi many particulars, immediately desert their prey 

 through fear on the approach of this bird, which is, as is well known, both 

 inferior in strength as well as in size to others of the Vulture family. 



The plumage of the King Vulture is marked with bright colours, strongly 

 contrasted ; the head and neck are tinged with brilliant colours, as orange, 

 purple, violet ; the ruff on its neck is gray, the back and tail a bright fawn, 

 which becomes darker as age advances ; the eye is circumscribed with a 

 scarlet line, and the legs are dusky black or reddish. It is of the same 

 family as the Great Condor, concerning which so much has been written 

 by travellers in South America. Mr. Darwin's account is worth tran- 

 scribing : 



" April 27. This day I shot a Condor. It measured from tip to tip of 

 the wings eight and a half feet, and from beak to tail four feet. This bird 

 is known to have a wide geographical range, being found on the west coast 

 of South America, from the Strait of Magellan along the Cordillera as far 

 as eight degrees N. of the equator. 



" With respect to their propagation, I was told by the country people 

 in Chile, that the Condor makes no sort of nest, but in the months of 

 November and December lays two large white eggs on a shelf of bare rock. 

 It is said that the young Condors cannot fly for an entire year ; and long 

 after they are able, they continue to roost by night, and hunt by day with 

 their parents. The old birds generally live in pairs ; but among the inland 

 basaltic cliffs of the Santa Cruz, I found a spot where scores must usually 

 haunt. On coming suddenly to the brow of the precipice, it was a grand 

 spectacle to see between twenty and thirty of these great birds start heavily 

 from their resting-place, and wheel away in majestic circles. From the 

 quantity of dung on the rocks, they must long have frequented this clifl'for 

 roosting and breeding. Having gorged themselves with carrion on the 

 plains below, they retire to these favourite ledges to digest their food. 

 From these facts, the Condor, like the Gallinazo, must to a certain degree 

 be considered as a gregarious bird. In this part of the country they live 

 altogether on the guanacos which have died a natural death, or, as more 

 commonly happens, have been killed by the pumas. I believe, from what 

 I saw in Patagonia, that they do not on ordinary occasions extend their 

 daily excursions to any great distance from their regular sleeping-places. 



" The Condons may oftentimes be seen at a great height, soaring over a 



certain spot in the most graceful circles. On some occasions I am sure 

 that they do this only for pleasure, but on others, the Chileno countryman 

 tells you that they are watching a dying animal, or the puma devouring its 

 prey. If the Condors glide down, and then suddenly all rise together, the 

 Chileno knows that it is the puma which, watching the carcass, has sprung 

 out to drive away the robbers. Besides feeding on carrion, the Condors 

 frequently attack young goats and lambs ; and the shepherd dogs are trained, 

 whenever they pass over, to run out, and looking upwards to bark violently. 

 The Chilenos destroy and catch numbers. Two methods are used ; one is 

 to place a carcass on a level piece of ground within an enclosure of sticks 

 with an opening, and when the Condors are gorged, to gallop up on horse- 

 back to the entrance, and thus enclose them : for when this bird has not 

 space to run, it cannot give its body sufficient momentum to rise from the 

 ground. The second method is to mark the trees in which, frequently to 

 the number of five or six together, they roost, and then at night to climb 

 up and noose them. They are such heavy sleepers, as I have myself wifc- 

 nessed, that this is not a difficult task. At Valparaiso, I have seen a living 

 Condor sold for sixpence ; but the common price is eight or ten shillings. 

 One which I saw brought in had been tied with rope, and was much 

 injured ; yet the moment the line was cut by which its bill was secured, 

 although surrounded by people, it began ravenously to tear a" piece of earrion. 

 In a garden at the same place, between twenty and thirty were kept alive. 

 They were fed only once a week, but they appeared in pretty good health. 

 The Chileno countrymen assert that the Condor will live, and retain its 

 vigour, between five and six weeks without eating : I cannot answer for the 

 truth of this, but it is a cruel experiment, which very likely has been tried. 



" When an animal is killed in the country, it is well known that the 

 Condors, like other Carrion- Vultures, soon gain intelligence of it, and con- 

 gregate in an inexplicable manner. In most cases it must not be overlooked, 

 that the birds have discovered their prey, and have picked the skeleton 

 clean, before the flesh is in the least degree tainted. Remembering the 

 experiments of M. Audubon, on the little smelling powers of carrion-hawks, 

 I tried in the above-mentioned garden the following experiment : the 

 Condors were tied, each by a rope, in a long row at the bottom of a wall ; 

 and having folded up a piece of meat in white paper, I walked backwards 

 and forwards, carrying it in my hand at the distance of about three yards 

 from them, but no notice whatever was taken. I then threw it on the 

 ground, within one yard of an old male bird ; he looked at it for a moment 

 with attention, but then regarded it no more. With a stick I pushed it 

 closer and closer, until at last he touched it with his beak ; the paper was 

 then instantly torn off with fury, and at the same moment every bird in 

 the long row began struggling and flapping its wings. Under the same 

 circumstances, it would have been quite impossible to have deceived a dog. 

 The evidence in favour of and against the acute smelling powers of Carrion- 

 Vultures is singularly balanced. Professor Owen has demonstrated that 

 the olfactory nerves of the Turkey-Buzzard (Cathartes aura) are highly 

 developed ; and on the evening when Mr. Owen's paper was read at the 

 Zoological Society, it was mentioned by a gentleman that he had seen the 

 Carrion-Hawks in the West Indies on two occasions collect on the roof of 

 a house, when a corpse had become offensive from not having been buried : 

 in this case, the intelligence could hardly have been acquired by sight. On 

 the other hand, besides the experiments of Audubon and that one by 

 myself, Mr. Bachman has tried in the United States many varied -plans, 

 showing that neither the Turkey-Buzzard (the species dissected by Professor 

 Owen) nor the Gallinazo find their food by smell. He covered portions of 

 highly-offensive offal with a thin canvas cloth, and strewed pieces of meat 

 on it ; these the Carrion- Vultures ate up, and then remained quietly standing, 

 with their beaks within the eighth of an inch of the putrid mass, without 

 discovering it. A small rent was made in the canvas, and the offal was 

 immediately discovered ; the canvas was replaced by a fresh piece, and 

 meat again put on it, and was again devoured by the Vultures without their 

 discovering the hidden mass on which they were trampling. 



" When the Condors are wheeling in a flock round and round any spot, 

 their flight is beautiful. Except when rising from the ground, I do not 



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