226 
TURKEY VULTURE. 
TURKEY VULTURE, OR TURKEY BUZZARD VULTUR 
AURA.— Plate LXXV. Fig. 1. 
Vultui* aura, Linn. Syst. ed. 10, tom. i. p. 86, 4. — Ind. Orn. p. 4, No. 8.— 
Vieillot, Ois. del' Am. Sep. i. p. 25, pi. 2, vis. — Carrion cvow, Shane, Jam. ii. 
p. 294. fol. 254. — Carrion vulture, Lath. Gen. Syn. i. p. 9. — Le vautour du 
Bresil, JBriss. i. p. 468. — Turkey buzzard, Cateshy, Car. i. p. 6. — JBartram's 
Travels, p. 289. — Cozca quantitti, Clavigero, Hist. Mex. i. p. 47 ; Eng. Trans. 
• — American vulture, Shaw, Gen. Zool.yn. p. 36.^ — Peale's Museum, 'No. ll,m. ; 
12, fern. 
CATHARTES Illiger.* 
Catbartes aura, Illig. Prod. — Bonap. Synop. p. 33. — North. Zool. ii. p. 4. 
This species is well known througliout the United States, 
blit is most numerous in the southern section of the Union. In 
*■ The vultures are comparatively a limited race, and exist in every quarter of 
the world, New Holland excepted ; * but their range is chiefly in the warm lati- 
tudes. 
Those of the New World seem to be contained in two genera, Sarcoramphus of 
Dumeril, and Catharies of Illiger ; the one containing the condur and Califor- 
nian vultures ; the other, the turkey buzzards, &c. of Wilson. They ai'e, per- 
haps, generally, the most unseemly and disgusting of the whole feathered race, of 
loose and ill kept plumage, of sluggish habits when not urged on by hunger, 
feeding on any animal food which they can easily tear to pieces, but often upon 
the most putrid and loathsome carrion. They have been introduced by the 
ancients, in their beautiful but wild conceptions and imagery, and have been em- 
bodied in the tales of fiction, and poems of the modern day, as all that is lurid 
disgusting, an d horrible. They are the largest of the feathered race, if we except 
the StruthionidcB, or that group to which the osti’ich, cassowary, and bustards be- 
long, and have long been celebrated on account of their great strength. Many 
* I have said “ New Holland excepted,” because we have yet no well authenticated in- 
stance of any thing approaching this form from that very interesting country. The New 
Holland vulture of Latham rests, to a certain extent, on dubious authority, and cannot now 
be referred to. I have no doubt that some representing group will be ultimately discovered, 
which may perhaps elucidate the principal forms wanting to the Raptores, and I know that 
Mr Swainson possesses a New Holland bird, whose station he has been unable to decide 
whether it will enter here, or range with the gallinaceous birds. I trust that that gentleman 
will, erelong, work out its affinities as far as possible, and give it to the public.— En. 
