426 



AVES— VULTURE. 



The black vulture is seldom found on the Atlantic, to the northward of 

 Newbern, North Carolina ; but inhabits the whole continent to the south- 

 ward as far as Cape Horn. 



THE LAMMERGEYER, OR BEARDED VULTURE.^ 



In its attitudes this bird resembles the eagles more than the vultures, its 

 confident and sprightly bearing strongly contrasting with the crouching and 

 suspicious postures of the latter. Like these, however, it generally retains 

 its wings in a state of half expansion when at rest, and its neck more or 

 less retracted Avithin its shoulders. Its food, as we shall presently see, is 

 more frequently sought in a living prey than on a putrefying carcass ; and 

 for this reason it is not often found, like the vultures, assembling in con- 

 siderable troops. The increased curvature of its talons also contributes to 

 the same object, by enabling it to carry off its prey, whether living or dead. 

 A careful comparison of their characters, or, what is far better, of the animals 

 themselves, as they exist side by side in the menagerie, will show how 

 nearly this bird holds the middle station between the two large groups to 

 which it is almost equally related. 



Several nominal species were created by the naturalists on the close of 

 the last century, which appear now, by common consent, to have been 

 merged into one, the bearded vulture of ornithologists, or lammergeyer of 

 the Swiss and German Alps. Its range extends to most of the principal 

 mountain chains of the Old Continent, as it is found, with more or less fre- 



1 Gypcetus barbaius, Cuv. The genus Gypeetus has a long bill; upper mandible arched 

 towards the point, and bent like a nook; nostrils oval, covered with stiff hairs directed 

 forward ; feet short ; four toes, the three anterior united by a short membrane, the middle 

 one very long ; nails slightly crooked ; wings long. 



