62 THE MISSISSIPPI KITE. 



Besides insects, it also feeds upon snakes and various small reptiles, and will sometimes, 

 though but rarely, kill small birds or mice. 



The wings are remarkably long in this species, and the legs short and feathered, a struc- 

 ture which gives clear indication that the bird is strong on the wing, and excels more in swift- 

 ness and activity of flight than in strength of beak or clutch of talons. In many of its habits this 

 species closely resembles the swallow-tailed falcon, and, like that bird, is capable of chasing 

 and capturing insects on the wing. The nest of the Black-winged Falcon is rather large, and 

 is generally built on a convenient forked branch. It is usually lined with moss and feathers, 

 and contains four or five whitish eggs. Although the bird may often be seen darting at the 

 crows, shrikes, and other predaceous birds that may pass near its residence, it has no inten- 

 tion of killing and eating them, but only wishes to drive them away from the vicinity of its 

 home. 



The head and neck of the Black-winged Falcon are silver-gray, the centres of its wings 

 are black, and the primaries and secondaries are grayish-brown, with gray edges. The 

 shoulder and the wings, breast, abdomen, and tail are pure white ; the cere and toes are 

 yellow, and the bill and claws black. When young, the back is brown, each feather being 

 tipped with white, and the breast is brown spotted with white. 



THE BLACK-SHOULDERED KITE (Elanus leucurus], called also the WHITE-TAILED KITE, 

 has a range of habitat about the same as the preceding, extending, however, into California. 



Charles Lucien Bonaparte, the eminent ornithologist, first described this bird from a 

 specimen he procured from Florida. Like the preceding, it feeds on insects and small reptiles. 

 It is exceedingly graceful, gaining the name Bailarin in South America, from its buoyant 

 flight the word signifying to balance. 



THE CROOK-BILLED FALCON derives its name from the shape of the beak, which is rather 

 long and narrow, and is curved over at the point so as to form a rather large and sharp hook. 



The distinctive characteristics in this bird, which was placed in the genus Cymindis. are 

 the short tarsus armed with net-like markings, and half clothed with feathers down their 

 front, the wings shorter than the tail, and small narrow nostrils, which are so closely con- 

 tracted as to resemble a mere cleft in the beak. The word Cymindis is Greek, and ought 

 rather to have been used to designate the night- jar than this Falcon. This species possesses 

 scales as well as reticulation upon the front of the tarsus. Its color when adult is a leaden- 

 blue, or gray on the upper portions of the body, and paler beneath. The tail is white at the 

 base, and deepens into an orange-gray at the extremity. Its quill feathers are edged with a 

 brownish ash, and the feet and cere are yellow. In its earlier stages of existence, the bird is 

 of an almost uniform brown, relieved by reddish hues on the cap of each feather, a yellow 

 stripe runs beneath the eyes, and little patches of the same color appear on the cheeks, and 

 the front of the neck is grayish-white. All the species that belong to this family live in 

 America. 



So does also a member of the genus Ictinia, which is very familiar to ornithologists under 

 the name of MISSISSIPPI KITE (Ictinia mississippiensis). 



This fine bird is a native of various parts of America, where it may be seen at a vast eleva- 

 tion in the air, sailing about in strange companionship with the turkey buzzard, and equalling 

 those birds in the power, grace, and readiness of flight. Why two such dissimilar birds should 

 thus inhabit the same region of air, and delight in each other's society, is a very perplexing 

 question, and requires a much clearer knowledge of the species and its habits before it can 

 be satisfactorily settled. The Mississippi Kite cares not for carrion, and is not absolutely 

 known to make prey of anything bigger than a locust. Yet, as Wilson well observes, the power- 

 ful hooked beaked and sharp claws seem as if they were intended by nature for the capture of 

 prey much more formidable than grasshoppers, locusts, and butterflies. In its flight, the 

 Mississippi Kite needs not to flap its wing, but sails on its airy course with the same easy grace 

 and apparent absence of exertion that is so characteristic of the flight of the vultures. 



