The different species of Gallinazos, which are much more considerable in point of numbers than the Condors, are also far more useful than the latter in the great economy of Nature for destroying and removing animal substances that are becoming decomposed, and thus purifying the atmosphere in the neighbourhood of human dwellings. In tropical America, I have sometimes seen seventy or eighty of these creatures collected round a dead ox; and I am able, as an eye-witness, to confirm the fact that has of late erroneously been called in question by ornithologists, that the appearance of one single king-vulture (who is not larger than the Gallinazos) is sufficient to put a whole assemblage of these birds to flight. No contest ever takes place; but the Gallinazos (two species of which, (Cathartes urubu and C. aura,) have been confounded together by an unfortunately fluctuating nomenclature) are intimidated by the sudden appearance and the courageous demeanour of the richly coloured “_Sarcoramphus Papa_.” As the ancient Egyptians protected the Percnopteri, which purified the atmosphere, so also the wanton destruction of Gallinazos is punished in Peru by a fine (_multa_) which, according to Gay, amounts in some cities to 300 piastres for every bird. It is a remarkable fact, that this species of vulture, as was already testified by Don Felix de Azara, if trained early, will so accustom themselves to the person who has reared them, that they will follow him on a journey for many miles, flying after his carriage across the Pampa. Footnote 73: p. 211—“_Encloses their rotating bodies_.” Fontana, in his admirable treatise “on the poison of the viper,” vol. i. p. 62, mentions that he succeeded in restoring to animation, after two hours’ immersion in a drop of water, a wheel-animalcule which had lain in a dried and motionless condition for the space of two years and a half.[JR]