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confpicuous a figure in the Arabian tales, under the name of the Roc, or 

 Rue. Much allowance mull dcubdefs be given to the enlarged accounts of 

 the ftrength and fiercenels recorded by the above-mentioned writers ; but 

 tliere is no reafon to queftion the exiftence of fome fpecies of American vulture 

 of a fize far greater than others of its genus, and which may be capable 

 of committing great devaftations amongft fuch of the animal ^^'orid as are expofed 

 to the fury of its attacks. 



In mufeums are fometimcs feen fpecimcns of the remio-es or lono- wino-- 

 feathers of this bird j and from thefe, if we may judge of the lize of the 

 bird they belonged to, according to the well-known rule of " ex pede Her- 

 culem " the bulk v.hich it fometimes attains, muft be greatly fuperior to 

 that of every other ipecies. In the Philofophical TranlaClions, vol. 18, p. 61, 

 is a defcription of the quills of a bird of this fort which was fliot in Cliili, 

 and which bird meafured 16 feet when the wings were extended. The bird 

 is faid to have been coloured black and white like a mag-pie, and furnilhed with 

 a Hiarp hard creft or comb on the head. Other accounts add that the throat 

 is naked and of a red colour, and that the neck is lurrounded by a white 

 ruff or tippet. The Count de Buffon imagines that thefe vultures are not 

 peculiar to America, but that they are fometimes found in Europe, and 

 feems inclined to think that the fpecies called by the Germans Lammer- 

 geyer may be the lame bird; b\]C this feems now to be clearly determined 

 in the negative : the Lammer-geyer of the Germans being no other than the 

 vultur-barbatus of Linnasus. But fince, notwithftanding the eagerncfs with 

 which natural hiftory is purfued, and the pains taken to enrich the European 

 mufeums with the moll interefting productions of both the Indies, it does 

 not appear that any full-grown fpecimens of this great American Vulture have 

 yet been imported, we muft be content that its hiftory and defcription fhould 

 ftill remain in fome degree involved in obfcurity. Linn^us, relying on the 

 ufual defcriptions given of it by moft authors, has admitted it into the 



Syftema 



