1835.] Bearded Vulture of the Himalaya. 457 



less setaceous than those laid over the bill, are likewise directed 

 backwards over the head, shading the hrows in two narrow lines, 

 which terminate near the occiput, and have a common origin with 

 the cere-coverts. The head, lores, and throat are perfectly clad in 

 short, soft, composed, narrow, and pointed plumes. These small 

 feathers give place suddenly, at the hind part of the head, to others 

 of the same lanceolate form, but of ample size and free set, which 

 adorn the whole neck, above and below, and have considerable affinity 

 to the vulturine ruff. The head is broad and flat crowned, but not 

 so fiat or so broad as in the vultures : the eye, like their's, mean and 

 small. The wings are of vast amplitude, reaching to within five inches 

 of the tip of a tail that is no less than 22 inches long. They are 

 high-shouldered, but less strikingly so than in the vultures. The 

 prime quills exceed the tertiaries by 6 inches : first remex 3| inches 

 less ; the 2nd, which is very little if at all inferior in length to the 

 3rd, and 4th, the longest of all. The outer vane of all these quills 

 is not emarginated ; but the inner is strongly so, remotely from their 

 tips. Though there be no appearance of moult in my specimen, I 

 suspect that the relation of the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th remiges, as above 

 stated, can hardly be the permanent and characteristic one ; which 

 probably gives 4th quill longest. The tail is longer than in any 

 aquiline or vulturine bird I know, and is much and regularly gradated 

 on the sides, the extreme lateral feathers being six inches shorter than 

 the central ones ; I should call the tail, therefore, wedged. 



The legs are very short, and less muscular than in the genus 

 Vultur ; tarsi low and completely plumed, as in the Golden Eagle : 

 thigh coverts long, reaching, (if directed towards them,) to the bases of 

 the toes. The toes and talons are of the aquiline type : the former 

 of medial unequal length and thickness, and reticulated, with the 

 outer toes connected to the centrals by a large basal membrane : the 

 latter, or talons, larger, acuter, and more falcate, than in the vulture, 

 and as much so as in most of the Falconidse : the outer fore and hind 

 talon largest and equal ; the central, less considerably ; and the in- 

 ner, as much smaller again. The general colour of our specimen is 

 dark brown above, and rusty below ; but the whole upper part of the 

 back, and the top of the ruff on its dorsal aspect, are nearly unmixed 

 pale orange : the shafts of the wing and tail feathers are mostly 

 white; and their vanes, as well as those of the wing-coverts, are 

 irregularly varied (for the most part, internally) with yellowish 

 marginal or central streaks. The entire ruff, except where it fringes 

 the occiput, is saturate, unmixed, brown ; and the throat is essentially 

 the same, but paler, and touched, here and there, with yellow. The 



