The California Condor 



and I should judge that the nature of the floor, dry sand, would ensure 

 an exceptionally sanitary condition. 



The fragments of the shell were examined, and these were certainly 

 of a creamy white color, not pale niagara green, as is usual with this 

 species. 



The mother bird (supposedly) sat quietly, but not indifferently, 

 through all these proceedings. There was an air of gentle breeding and 

 dignity about this bird which not even the bizarre coloration of her 

 head-dress could destroy. Indeed, the head with its orange-colored beak 

 and frontal plate, crossed at*the eyes with a black band, sits rather like 

 a jewel in its setting of a shiny black ruff; while the feet and legs, of a 

 shining flesh-color, stand out again in high relief as the bird perches. 

 Although the bird fled at our closer photographic approach, she did not 

 quit the neighborhood nor did she attempt to enter the nest. Instead, she 

 gyrated about, or swept to and fro near the entrance in solicitous fashion. 

 It is worthy of remark that the Turkey Vultures were abundant about 

 these cliffs, and that the Condor paid no heed whatever to them. One 

 inquisitive Turkey swept in repeatedly, passing closer to the nest than 

 ever the mother had done, and I looked for trouble; but the gentle lady 

 gave no appearance of resentment. At a later time, however, when we 

 were preparing to quit the place, an ominous rushing sound, a war of 

 wings, caused us to look up in apprehension. A Condor, presumably the 

 male, was pursuing an entirely black bird, doubtless the intruder of the 

 morning, and although the youngster managed to elude a stroke, he rued 

 his rashness for a good half-mile. Family discipline must be maintained 

 in even a gentle breed. 



The foregoing account of a Condor's nesting is confessedly a rather 

 prosaic affair. Nothing very spectacular happened. We returned sans 

 egg, sans skin (thank God!) and, as the event proved, sans photographs, 

 but we brought the Condor away in our hearts. The following "estimate," 

 derived from many sources, but chiefly from two, is hardly the impersonal 

 judgment of science. It is, rather, the warm-blooded appreciation of one 

 who has been taught reverence by personal contact with one of the out- 

 standing characters of the bird-world. I am not ashamed to have fallen 

 in love with so gentle a ghoul; and though I should not choose to dine 

 with him, I am assured that if I did, my brother would not crowd me nor 

 cheat me of my portion. And who are we that we should sit in judgment 

 upon a brother who takes his meat a bit rarer than our own? A dead 

 cow is, after all, a dead cow, is it not? And what if he does not kill his 

 own meat. Do you? Or do you, like him, meekly accept from the gods 

 of circumstance the meats which have been provided? "Government 

 certified!" Fiddlesticks! The Condor's meat is certified by the sun. 



1725 



