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HARPY

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Originally appearing in Volume V13, Page 16 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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HARPY , a large diurnal See also:

bird of See also:prey, so named after the mythological See also:monster of the classical poets (see See also:HARPIES),—the Thrasaetus harpyia of See also:modern ornithologists—an inhabitant of the warmer parts of See also:America from See also:Southern See also:Mexico to See also:Brazil. Though known since the See also:middle of the 17th See also:century, its habits have come very little under the See also:notice of naturalists, and what is said of them by the older writers must be received with some Harpy. suspicion. A cursory inspection of the bird, which is not unfrequently brought alive to See also:Europe, its See also:size, and its enormous See also:bill and talons, at once suggest the vast See also:powers of destruction imputed to it, and are enough to See also:account for the stories told of its ravages on mammals—sloths, fawns, peccaries and spider-monkeys. It has even been asserted to attack the human See also:race. How much of this is fabulous there seems no means at See also:present of determining, but some of the statements are made by veracious travellers—D'See also:Orbigny and See also:Tschudi. It is not uncommon in the forests of the See also:isthmus of See also:Panama, and Salvin says (Prot. Zool. Society, 1864, p. 368) that its See also:flight is slow and heavy. Indeed its See also:owl-like visage, its See also:short wings and soft plumage, do not indicate a bird of very active habits, but the weapons of offence with which it is armed show that it must be able to See also:cope with vigorous prey. Its See also:appearance is sufficiently striking—the See also:head and See also:lower parts, -except a See also:pectoral See also:band, See also:white, the former adorned with an erectile See also:crest, the upper parts dark See also:grey bandec with See also:black, the wings dusky, and the tail barred; but the huge bill and powerful scutellated legs most of all impress the be-holder.

The precise See also:

affinities of the harpy cannot be said tc have been determined. By some authors it is referred to the eagles, by others to the buzzards, and by others again to the See also:hawks; but possibly the first of these alliances is the most likely to be true. (A.

End of Article: HARPY

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