ORDER ACCIPITRES. 171 



organ of elevation ; and the condor soars above the height of 

 Chimborazo, an elevation six times greater than that of the 

 clouds above our plains. " This," he says, " is a point not 

 unworthy the consideration of future travellers." 



The fleshy, or rather cartilaginous crest of the condor occu- 

 pies the summit of the head, and one-fourth of the length of 

 the beak. This crest is entirely wanting in the female, and 

 M. Daudin has erroneously attributed it to her. It is of an 

 oblong figure, wrinkled, and very slender. It rests on the 

 forehead, and the hinder part of the beak ; but at the base of 

 the beak it is free, and almost sloped. In the void thus made, 

 are situated the nostrils ; for without this sloping off of the crest, 

 the scent of the animal would be very feeble. The skin of the 

 head in the male forms behind the eye, folds, or rugosities, like 

 barbies, which descend towards the neck, and unite in a flabby 

 membrane, which the animal can render more or less visible 

 by inflating it at pleasure, much in the same way that all turkies 

 do. It is proper, however, to observe, that the crest of the con- 

 dor does not at all resemble the comb of a cock, or the flabby 

 eone of the turkey. It is very hard, coriaceous, furnished with 

 very few vessels, and cannot be inflated ; in an anatomical point 

 of view, it has no analogy with the thick caruncle of the Vultur 

 papa. The ear of the condor exhibits a veiy considerable 

 aperture ; but it is concealed under the folds of the temporal 

 membrane. The eye is singularly elongated, more remote from 

 the bealc than in the eagles ; very lively, and of a purple colour. 

 The entire neck is garnished with parallel wrinkles ; but the 

 skin is less flaccid than that which covers the throat. These 

 wrinkles are placed longitudinally ; and arise from the habit of 

 this vulture of contracting its neck, and concealing it in the 

 collar, which answers the purpose of a hood. 



This collar, which is neither less broad, nor less white in the 

 adult female than in the male, is formed of a fine silken down. 

 It is a white band, which separates from the naked part of the 

 neck the body of the bird furnished with genuine feathers. 

 Linnaeus, and after him Daudin, have both asserted, but with- 



