328 THE BIRDS OF THE BRITISH ISLES. 



Avhen he said that where it " builds, look to lesser linen." It is 

 acquisitive. In the only nest I have seen wool and paper 

 showed distinctly in amongst the sticks ; it was not a neat or 

 carefully concealed structure, but a large nest some fifty feet 

 up in an oak, well away from the trunk (Plate 139). Both sexes 

 collect this rubbish, but apparently only the female broods. 

 The two or three eggs are dirty white streaked, smeared and 

 Hned with reddish brown (Plate 147), and are usually laid in 

 Wales about the middle of April. The young are clothed in 

 white and pale-brown down. 



The head of the adult is white, streaked with black, the rest 

 of the upper parts reddish brown with paler edgings to the 

 feathers. The under parts are red with dark streaks. The bill 

 is bluish horn, the cere, legs and irides yellow. The young- 

 bird is duller and has a brown head. The female is only 

 slightly larger than the male. Length, 25 ins. Wing, 20 ins. 

 Tarsus, 2*3 ins. 



Black Kite. Milvus migrans (Bodd.). 



The Black Kite, a bird of south and central Europe and 

 north-west Africa, which migrates in winter to tropical Africa, 

 has twice been taken in Britain — in Northumberland and 

 Aberdeen. It has the same habits of hunting for offal and 

 food, and of collecting rubbish for its nest, as our bird. Its tail 

 is less forked, and it looks a darker and " blacker" bird on the 

 wing than our " Red " Kite, but its plumage is little different. 

 It is not so white on the head, is browner and less rufous, 

 especially on the tail, and the margins to the feathers are 

 not so noticeable. Length, 24 ins. Wing, 18 ins. Tarsus, 

 2'25 ins. 



