IX CARRION-VULTURES 195 



of it, and congregate in an inexplicable manner. In most 

 cases it must not be overlooked that the birds have discovered 

 their prey, and have picked the skeleton clean, before the flesh 

 is in the least degree tainted. Remembering the experiments 

 of M. Audubon, on the little smelling powers of carrion-hawks, 

 I tried in the above-mentioned garden the following ex- 

 periment : the condors were tied, each by a rope, in a long row 

 at the bottom of a wall ; and having folded up a piece of meat 

 in white paper, I walked backwards and forwards, carrying it in 

 my hand at the distance of about three yards from them, but 

 no notice whatever was taken. I then threw it on the ground, 

 within one yard of an old male bird ; he looked at it for a 

 moment with attention, but then regarded it no more. With a 

 stick I pushed it closer and closer, until at last he touched it 

 with his beak ; the paper was then instantly torn off with fury, 

 and at the same moment every bird in the long row began 

 struggling and flapping its wings. Under the same cir- 

 cumstances it would have been quite impossible to have 

 deceived a dog. The evidence in favour of and against the 

 acute smelling powers of carrion-vultures is singularly balanced. 

 Professor Owen has demonstrated that the olfactory nerves of 

 the turkey-buzzard (Cathartes aura) are highly developed ; and 

 on the evening when Mr. Owen's paper was read at the 

 Zoological Society, it was mentioned by a gentleman that he 

 had seen the carrion-hawks in the West Indies on two occasions 

 collect on the roof of a house, when a corpse had become 

 offensive from not having been buried : in this case, the intelli- 

 gence could hardly have been acquired by sight. On the other 

 hand, besides the experiments of Audubon and that one by 

 myself, Mr. Bachman has tried in the United States many 

 varied plans, showing that neither the turkey-buzzard (the 

 species dissected by Professor Owen) nor the gallinazo find their 

 food by smell. He covered portions of highly offensive offal 

 with a thin canvas cloth, and strewed pieces of meat on it ; 

 these the carrion-vultures ate up, and then remained quietly 

 standing, with their beaks within the eighth of an inch of the 

 putrid mass, without discovering it. A small rent was made in 

 the canvas, and the offal was immediately discovered ; the canvas 

 was replaced by a fresh piece, and meat again put on it, and 

 was again devoured by the vultures without their discovering the 



