extirpated. It is because their
places of breeding and retreat are accessible--not only to man but to
hosts of other enemies--that such creatures as eagles and the like are
so scarce. Not so with the condor. His race can never become extinct
so long as the Andes exist; and that is likely to be for a good long
period, I fancy."

"What sort of nests do they build?" inquired Francois.

"They do not build nests," replied Lucien, "they choose a cavity in the
rocks, or in the soil around them, where they lay two large white oval
eggs, and hatch them just as other vultures do. Strange to say, very
little is known of their mode of life in their elevated haunts; but this
is because the natives of the Sierras rarely venture up to the high
regions where the condors dwell. All they know of them is what they
see, when these great birds descend upon the plateaux, or inhabited
mountain-valleys, in search of food--which they do only in the mornings
and evenings. During mid-day the condor usually perches upon some high
rock, and there goes to sleep. When pressed by hunger, they sometimes
extend their range down to the hot coast lands of the Pacific Ocean; but
they are evidently birds that can bear cold much better than heat.

"The _King-vulture_," continued Lucien, "is the next species that claims
our attention. He is also a Sarcoramph (_Sarcoramphus Papa_), and the
only one of that genus besides the condor. He is unlike the condor in
many respects. He is not much of a mountain bird, but prefers the low
savannas and open plains. He prefers heat to cold, and he is rarely met
with outside the tropics, although he makes occasional visits to the
peninsula of Florida and the northern plains of Mexico; but in these
places he is only a rare and migratory bird. He feeds principally upon
carrion, and dead fish that have been left by the drying-up of ponds and
lakes; but he will also kill and eat serpents, lizards, and small
mammiferous animals. Bartram states that in Florida he only appears
after the savannas have been on fire, when he is seen to pass over the
ground amidst the black ashes, hunting for and devouring the snakes and
lizards that have been killed by the fire. Bartram, therefore, infers
that his food must consist altogether of _roasted_ reptiles; but as it
would be sometimes difficult for him to procure a supply of these
ready-cooked, I think we may safely conclude that he does not object to
eating them _raw_. The f