240 PANDION IIALIAETUS. 



which it captures for itself, has a form and structure intelh- 

 gibly correspondent with its habits. It is now so scarce a bird 

 with us that many years may eLapse before a person can procure 

 one entire for examination. I have been fortunate however 

 in this respect, having obtained three individuals, two of which 

 were killed in Scotland. The body is proportionally small, but 

 compact and muscular ; the pectoral muscles in particular being- 

 very large, and the spine of the sternum correspondingly promi- 

 nent. The head is of moderate size, oblong ; the neck rather 

 short, and strong. The bill shorter than the head, very strong, 

 rather higher than broad at the base ; the upper mandible with 

 the cere narrow, the dorsal line a little declinate as far as the 

 edge of the cere, then decurved in nearly the third of a circle, 

 the ridge broadly convex, the edges with a slight festoon, the 

 tip deflected, subtrigonal, acute, and at the end perpendicular 

 to the gape-line ; the lower mandible with the angle short and 

 rather wide, the back broad, flattened at the base, rounded to- 

 ward the end, the edge-line arched, the tip obliquely truncate 

 and rounded. 



The mouth is of moderate width, its breadth being one inch 

 two twelfths ; the palate flat, with two prominent papillate 

 ridges, corresponding to the tongue, and an anterior median 

 ridge. The posterior aperture of the nares oblong, anteriorly 

 linear, slightly papillate on the margins. The tongue is one 

 inch long, sagittate and finely papillate behind, concave above, 

 with the margins rather thick, and the tip rounded, the back 

 horny as usual. The oesophagus is nine and a half inches long, 

 at first little more than an inch in width, but presently dilated 

 into a sac or crop, of which the greatest width is three inches ; 

 it then contracts to ten-twelfths of an inch, and enlarges to an 

 inch and a quarter in the proventricular portion. The coats 

 of the oesophagus are very thin ; the proventricular glands ex- 

 tremely numerous, very small, and arranged so as to form a 

 continuous belt, an inch in breadth. The stomach is round, a 

 little compressed, two inches in diameter ; its muscular coat 

 extremely thin, the inner smooth, without epithelium ; the 

 central tendons five-twelfths in breadth. The pylorus has a 

 slightly thickened margin, and three small knobs, terminating 



