SPORT AND TRAVEL 127 



eight eggs in all. I never saw more than one in a 

 nest, and they were all white, with one exception, which 

 was marked all over with pale brown streaks, and was 

 almost identical with the egg of a black vulture, which 

 I subsequently obtained. 



On May 9, I also visited the nest of a short-toed 

 eagle (Circdetus gallicus) built on the flat top of a 

 high fir-tree from which I had taken one egg in 

 1894. I found the bird on the nest, and when it 

 flew off, could see with the glasses, from the rocks 

 far above, that it had been sitting on two eggs. 

 These eggs I took, and found them so much incu- 

 bated that they were very near hatching. Like the 

 one I took in 1894, they must have been laid early in 

 February. 



On the night of March n, a good deal of sleet 

 and rain fell at our camp ; and on going up the moun- 

 tain the next morning, we found everything shrouded 

 in thick mist. After ascending the mountain-side for 

 about five hundred feet, we found the ground and all 

 the fir and juniper trees thickly covered with snow. 

 About nine o'clock the mist cleared off, and the moun- 

 tain-side looked most beautiful, the foliage of every 

 tree bearing a burden of light and feathery new-fallen 

 snow. A black vulture, sitting on its nest on the top 

 of a fir-tree, which was completely covered with snow, 

 looked most curious. However, when the sun came 

 out, the snow soon began to melt, and by the evening 

 there was little left save on the highest parts of the 



