AGCIPITRES 



481 



The skull has strong basipterygoid processes. The 

 lacrymals are large and extend backwards in close connec- 

 tion with the skull wall ; they are not ankylosed to it. The 

 descending process is thin and articulates with the slight 

 ectethmoid. There is a small knife-shaped vomer. 



The family CathartidsB consists of the genera Sarco- 

 rhamphus (condor), Gyparchus (or Gypagus, king vul- 

 ture), Cathartes (turkey 

 vulture), and Bhinogry- 

 phus. They all have, so 

 far as is known, the oil 

 gland nude, twelve rec- 

 trices, no aftershaft, and 

 are aquincubital. 



The tongue is large 

 and fleshy, with denticul- 

 ations of its upturned 

 lateral margins. 



The stomach is not 

 a gizzard. There are no 

 intestinal cceca. The in- 

 testines are 61-inch in 

 Gyparchus, 49-inch in 

 Cathartes atratus. Of 

 the heart of the condor 

 some observations will be 

 found above (p. 50) ; both 

 carotids are present. The 

 li/oer is equilobed, with a 

 gall bladder. There are in 

 Gyparchus traces of a crop. 



The most distinctive feature of the Cathartidse, however, 

 is the windpipe, from which a proper syrinx may be really 

 said to be absent. The only muscles upon the trachea are 

 the sterno-tracheales, which (in G. papa) are very short and 

 broad, and arise from the sternum in the middle line, close 

 together between the inner ends of the coracoids. Intrinsic 

 syringeal muscles are entirely absent in the Cathartidse, 



Fig. 228.— Skull of Serpentarius 

 (atteb Hxixley). 



Pxm^ premaxilla ; Mxp^ maxillo-palatines ; P?; 

 palatine ; Pt, pterygoid ; x, basipterygoid process. ■ 



