464 Descriptions and Habits of 



which had so much interested me repeated, I turned off, to 

 make another trial to ascertain its cause ; and, making my 

 way through the tangled undergrowth, to the verge of the 

 senote, I perceived, on the top cf the same tree, the hawk, 

 or one of the same species, in the act of uttering the cry 

 which I have described, and from which I have named the 

 bird. I crawled carefully round, till I got near enough, and 

 shot him ; and, on dissection, he proved to be the male. 



Male. Bill strongly hooked, very obtusely toothed, robust, 

 almost black ; cere greenish yellow ; nostrils large and round ; 

 iris hazel ; feet and legs rather long and slender, yellow ; 

 claws horn-color, strongly hooked, and rather long ; head, 

 nape, back, outside of wings and wing coverts and tail dark 

 brown, almost black ; on head and upper part of back, chin, 

 cheeks, collar round neck, all under parts and thighs, and four 

 or five narrow bands on upper side, and six or seven on under 

 side, and lip of tail, white. 



Total length 23 inches ; bill along ridge 1^ inches; same 

 along gape; nostril -f.j of an inch in diameter; wing from 

 flexure 10| inches; tarsus 31 inches; middle toe 2| inches, 

 of which I of an inch is claw; hind toe H inches, of which 

 1^ is claw ; tail 1 1 } inches, of twelve feathers, rounded ; first 

 primary shortest, fifth and sixth longest ; outer tail feathers 

 8 inches, middle lOJ inches. 



Female. Much the same as male, white bands on tail broader. 



Total length 25| inches; wing from flexure, 1-2 inches; 

 tarsus 3ff inches ; hind toe 2^ inches ; tail 12^ inches ; lateral 

 tail feathers lOg^ inches. Other dimensions in same pro- 

 portion. 



CORVUS VOCIFERUS, Nobis. CLAMORors Crow. 



I first saw these birds while residing in the ruins of Uxmal. 

 Each evening, just at sundown, I observed five or six, and 

 sometimes more, birds, whicli I knew, by their cry. must be- 

 long to the genus Corvus, though much louder, and more 

 disagreeable, than any jay that I had ever heard before. They 

 came and alighted, for a few minutes, on the branches of a 

 dry tree, which stood on the lower terrace of the Ca&a del 



