This strange looking bird is also a bird of prey; but it feeds generally on dead carcases or offal. There are several kinds of vulture. The largest of all birds of prey is the Condor, a South American species. There is also the King Vulture, a native of the same country, called so not from its size, for it is the smallest of the race, but from its elegant plumage. Mr. Waterton, the naturalist, relates a little story of a King Vulture, which seems to show that, though so much smaller, this bird is regarded with some degree of reverence by the common vultures. He says that "the carcase of a large snake, which he had killed in the forest, becoming putrid, about twenty of the common vultures came and perched in the neighbouring trees; amongst them came also the King of the Vultures; and he observed that none of the common ones seemed inclined to begin breakfast till his majesty had finished. When he had consumed as much snake as nature informed him would do him good, he retired to the top of a high mora-tree, and then all the common vultures fell to, and made a hearty meal." Mr. Waterton also observed that the day after the planter had burnt the trash in a cane-field, the King Vulture might be seen feeding on the snakes, lizards, and frogs, which had suffered in the conflagration. Indeed the vulture is of real service in this respect, for he clears the carrion away from the hot countries he inhabits, which would otherwise putrify and infect the air. In some places, as at Paramaribo, the value of these birds, on this account, is so fully recognized, that they are protected by law, a fine being imposed on him who kills one.

The vulture is to be found in almost all hot countries. A traveller in Abyssinia speaks of having seen them hovering, as a black cloud, over an army of soldiers, in numbers like the sands of the sea. After a battle they come sweeping down to feed upon the slain. Indeed they prefer dead to living food, and must be endowed with a wonderfully keen sense of sight or smell, the former is thought most likely, as no sooner does a beast of burden drop in the deserts exhausted on the sands, than vultures begin to make their way towards the carcase. Whence they come none can tell, and the only probable suggestion is that they hover at a height beyond the ken of human eye over a passing caravan, for they are first noticed as specks in the air above, moving slowly round in circles as they descend spirally upon their prey.

These birds are most voracious, gorging themselves with as much as they can possibly contrive to swallow. They are also very strong and difficult to kill, one of the condors having been known to walk about after it had been strangled and hung on a tree with a lasso for several minutes, and to keep on its legs after receiving three balls from a pistol.

The vulture is wonderfully fitted by nature for the part it has to fill as "scavenger" abroad, this being the name they often go by. It is large and strong, so that the carcase of a horse or a buffalo is not too much for it to attack. Its legs are strong, but not armed with sharp claws like those of birds that feed on living prey. Its wings are long and wide, and its bones, though thick, unusually light, so that the bird can remain an immense time poised in the highest regions of the atmosphere. Its beak is strong and hooked, and remarkably well formed for tearing or dividing, and what is still more noticeable, the head and neck which, from the disgusting nature of its food, must often be buried in unclean carcases, are quite, or very nearly, destitute of feathers, which, in such a situation, would be soon covered with dirt or blood, and could not be kept clean by the bird's own bill. The smell of vultures is, as may be supposed, very offensive, and they are altogether very disagreeable birds to have anything to do with; but they are appointed to fill a particular office in the world, and are found invaluable in performing it.

The largest vultures are fifteen or sixteen feet from the tip of one wing to the tip of the other, even when not stretched to the utmost, and four feet from beak to tail. Its legs are as thick as a man's wrist, and its middle claw seven inches long. They bring forth their young on the tops of inaccessible rocks, in sunny regions, more than twelve thousand feet above the level of the sea.

The European Vulture dwells amongst the Alps, but flies as far as the mountains of Africa and Asia. It is not so large as the condor, seldom exceeding the size of an eagle.