1883. ] The Power of Scent in the Turkey Vulture. 831 
out, this disturbance probably releasing for a time the pent-up 
odors. 
I could detect no taint in the atmosphere of the place even 
whilst working in the freshly-plowed ground, yet hundreds of 
buzzards assembled from far and near, and with unerring accuracy 
pointed out the place of burial with overshadowing wings. In 
consequence of these observations the theory that the vulture 
family are enabled to detect the existence of a dead body by 
scent, unassisted by any of the remaining senses, and this 
too at great distances, and when such carcass had laid deep under 
the ground for several years, was to me satisfactorily proven. 
Gosse, as I before stated, gives an instance confirmatory to the 
one just related, justly attributing to the same species of vulture 
this wondrous faculty of tracking its prey from afar. It was ob- 
served in Jamaica : 
“A poor German immigrant, who lived alone in a detached 
cottage in this town, rose from his bed after a few days’ confine- 
ment by fever to purchase in the market some fresh meat for 
a little soup. Before he could prepare the several ingredients of 
herbs and roots, and put his meat in water for the preparation of 
his pottage, the paroxysm of his fever had returned, and he laid 
himself on his bed exhausted. Two days elapsed in this state of 
helplessness and inanimation, by which time the mass of meat 
and pot herbs had putrefied. The stench became very per- 
ceptible in the neighborhood, vulture after vulture as they sailed 
past were observed always to descend to the cottage of the Ger- 
man, and to sweep round as if they had tracked some putrid 
carcass, but failed to find exactly where it was.” 
The same authority proceeds to prove furthermore that not 
only does the object of contention make use of its nose, but also 
of its eyes in the search for subsistence. I will give this quotation 
o: 
“ Here was the sense of sight unassisted by that of smelling, 
for the meat was too recent to communicate any taint to the morn- 
ing air, and the vulture stooped to it from a very far distance. 
