168 Lord Lilford on the Ornitliology of Spain. 



to my mind many a pleasant evening passed in divers Spanish 

 ventas listening to stories of la caza mayor y menor, and inquir- 

 ing and learning many things concerning the haunts and habits 

 of my feathered friends. But I am forgetting that this paper is 

 not intended as a eulogy of Spain and the Spaniards, but an 

 attempt to add to our knowledge of her ornithology; so I 

 will begin at the beginning, and tell what I know about the 

 Birds of Prey. 



My first introduction to the Griffon Vulture {Gyps fulvus 

 ? occidentalis) in his native haunts took place on the banks 

 of the Guadalquivir below Seville, where we saw a party of at 

 least forty of these birds regaling upon a dead horse ; they tool( 

 very little notice of the steamer, apparently knowing that, on 

 account of the shoal water, they were just out of gunshot. I 

 have since met with this Vulture in all parts of Spain which I 

 have visited, in great abundance, particularly in April 1864, in the 

 Sierra de la Palmitera near Marbella, where we were encamped 

 for two days in pursuit of Ibex {Capra hispanica). I cannot 

 take upon myself to say whether the Griffon Vulture of Southern 

 Spain belongs to the form occidentalis of Schlegel ; but I imagine 

 that it does, as all the individuals that I have seen there pre- 

 sent precisely the same characters as the Griffons of the island of 

 Sardinia, which I find Count Salvadori, in his most interesting 

 Catalogue*, refers without hesitation to that race. I may here 

 mention that by far the majority of the Griffon Vultures of Epirus 

 are extremely light in colour, and, I think, somewhat superior in 

 size to those of Spain and Sardinia. Brehm states that all the 

 specimens of this Vulture which he saw in Spain belonged to 

 the occidentalis form. The Spaniards call all the large Vultures 

 Buitre, occasionally distinguishing the present species as Buitre 

 franciscano from the Cinereous Vulture ( Vultur monachus), which 

 they term Buitre negro ; this last species is not uncommon in An- 

 dalucia, though not so abundant as in the island of Sardinia, where 

 it is perhaps the most frequent of the Vulturida. I observed a 

 pair or two in company with the Griffons, in the mountains near 

 Marbella, as mentioned above, and near Cordova I several times 

 observed it. This bird appears to be more fond of trees than the 

 * Catalogo degli Uccelli di Sardegna. Milano: 1864. 



