AN ABERRANT HAWK 
above. A condor a trifle farther off observes the interest 
shown by its companion, and so on to the uttermost 
verges of Peru. The condor is sure to be on view at the 
Zoo, it is so very excellent a bird for menagerie pur- 
poses—a statement which would appear to be unlikely 
if there were no facts to support it. But they live long, 
and in the year 1889 died an old bird which was purchased 
so long ago as 1856. The very first specimen ever 
acquired was bought in 1853. Besides the common 
condor known as Sarcorhamphus gryphus, is another 
form, the “condor pardo,’’ which is through life of 
a brown colour, a hue which belongs to the young of 
the common species. 
THE SECRETARY BIRD 
This handsome long-legged hawk is practically always 
on view at the Zoo. Its grey body with black wings, 
its stilt-like legs, and the tuft of feathers on the head 
which have suggested the name, mark it out as an 
abnormal form of the Falconid tribe. Its deeper lying 
structures show it to be not very far removed from the 
eagle tribe, but still to form a very distinct group of its 
own, which is thought by some to be nearer to the root 
of the rapacious birds than any existing form. The 
bird is purely African, and ranges from north to south. 
On the west it has been given a different name. Its 
range in that continent is not at all unlike that of the 
crowned crane. The name of secretary bird is thought 
by some to have been derived from the tuft of feathers 
on the head, which suggest a bunch of pens carried by 
a clerk. Others again have held they are like arrows, 
and that the name is a corruption of Sagittarius. Ser- 
pentarius reptilivorus is its scientific appellation. The 
bird is one to be fostered, and it is indeed on the 
protected list; for it attacks and gets the better of the 
numerous venomous serpents of Africa. Its mode of 
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