266 
DIURNAL BIRDS OF PREY. 
one great group equal in rank to a second including only the present family. Some 
ornithologists go even further than this, and refuse to admit the American vultures 
within the limits of the Accipitrine order; but the correctness of this view we are 
not yet prepared to admit. Agreeing in general appearance and their hare heads 
and necks with the vultures of the Old World, the American vultures can be 
distinguished at a glance by the absence of any partition between the two nostrils, 
so that (as seen in our figure of the turkey-vulture on p. 275) there is a hole right 
through the upper part of the beak. They also differ from the Falconidce and 
Vulturidce by the absence of after-shafts to the feathers; in which respect, as also in 
the presence of basipterygoid processes on the rostrum of the skull and in the naked 
oil-gland, they resemble the owls. A remarkable peculiarity of the group is the 
absence of a syrinx, or voice-organ, in the lower part of the windpipe, in consequence 
of which the only sound that these birds can utter is a kind of hiss. In their length 
of limb these vultures agree with the Old World group, but the first toe is more 
elevated. There are, altogether, about nine species of these birds, of which the 
majority are at least partly South American, although the range of the family 
extends about as far north as the northern boundary of the United States. 
Largest of all the birds of prey, the condor of the Andes 
(Sarcorhampus gryphus ) is the type of a genus characterised by 
the head of the male being furnished with a large erect fleshy wattle, which forms 
a median crest immediately behind the beak; and also by the rounded wings, 
in which the primary and secondary quills are of nearly equal length, exceeding 
twice the length of the tail. The first toe is very short; while the second and fourth 
toes are of nearly equal length. The female lacks the head-wattle of the male; 
but in both sexes the beak is characterised by its comparative shortness and 
depth. In the male condor the general colour of the plumage may be described as 
glossy black with grey on the wings; most of the wing-coverts, as well as all the 
secondaries and the inner primaries, having their external margins ashy white. 
The large downy ruff' round the neck is pure white; and the bare parts of the 
head, neck, and chest have a wrinkled and mostly dark coloured skin, developed 
into a wattle on the throat and another on the chest. Horny brown at the base, 
the bill becomes ivory-white at the tip, while the feet are blackish, and the iris 
of the eye pale brown. In the smooth-headed and smaller female the iris is red, 
and there are no wattles on the neck and chest. According to Darwin, the length 
of the male is about 48 inches, and the body is of immense size and weight, while 
the span of the wings probably reaches 9 feet. A smaller condor from Ecuador 
and Quito has a uniformly brown plumage, and the whole beak blackish. 
The condor is especially characteristic of the Peruvian and Chilian Andes, 
where it is usually found in the zone lying between nine thousand and sixteen 
thousand feet; its range extends, however, from Quito to the extreme southern 
point of the Continent, and in Patagonia it frequents the steep cliffs on the coast. 
It has been often stated that these birds may be seen soaring round the highest 
peaks of the Andes, from whence they suddenly descend to the level of the plains, 
but the observations of Mr. Whymper have shown that this is incorrect. In 
the neighbourhood of Chimborazo that traveller never observed these birds 
anywhere near the mountain summits, whence he concludes that the upper limit 
