It lives only in warm or hot climates, and there it is very useful, though you might at first be
puzzled to think how this can be. It is because it lives upon such things as would be very
injurious to man if they were left to decay in the open air. It not only consumes the dead bodies
of animals, but takes away many things from the streets of the cities which the inhabitants are
too indolent to remove. It is for this reason that in the city of Cairo, in Egypt, there is a law
forbidding any person to kill a vulture. These birds sometimes follow an army, and prey upon
the bodies of those poor soldiers who have been killed in battle. Ah ! it is a sad thing to go to
war; almost every thing about it is sad.
The vulture has a very keen eye, and, like the eagle, can see what is on the ground, even when it
is very high in the air. This is referred to in the book of Job. "There is a path which no fowl
knoweth, and which the vulture's eye hath not seen." It often happens in those countries that
almost as soon as an ox, or a horse, or any other large animal has been killed, great multitudes of
vultures will gather around, though not one could be seen in the sky before. they seem to fly
down from every part of the heavens, and being to pull and struggle for the flesh of the animal;
until in the course of a few hours nothing is left but the bones. We read in Isaiah, "There shall
the vultures be gathered, every one with her mate." This must have been written by one who had
seen these birds coming together, as they do in great flocks or companies.
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