CONCERNING VULTURES 
187 
birds are bare, or merely covered with short 
down; a provision of Nature that enables 
them to indulge in their carrion-feeding habits 
without soiling or clogging their plumage. 
They are found in various parts of the world, 
but their distribution is mainly restricted to 
tropical and warm countries. Occasionally, 
however, they stray far from their usual 
haunts, the Egyptian vulture having been 
captured in England on two occasions, and 
once so far away as Norway; while a griffon 
vulture has been seen in Ireland. 
Vultures may be divided into two well- 
defined groups, namely, the true or Old World 
vultures, and the American or New World 
vultures. These differ the one from the other 
in many respects. The voice of the latter, 
for instance, is merely a hiss and in no way 
comparable to the full-toned and loud notes 
that their Old World brethren are capable 
of uttering. The American vultures can also 
be distinguished by the character of their 
nostrils which have no internal partition between 
them, so that, when viewed from one side, it 
is possible to see right through them. 
For long it was a matter of dispute as to 
how vultures discovered their food, and how 
it was they congregated in such vast numbers, 
and so rapidly, around a carcass or dying 
