318 FALCO iESALON. 



pact and muscular as the Peregrine, with the body rather short, 

 ovate, and of somewhat greater depth than breadth anteriorly ; 

 the neck short ; the head lai-ge, broadly ovate or roundish, and 

 flattened above. The bill is very short and strong ; the upper 

 mandible with its dorsal outline decurved from the base, in 

 nearly the fourth of a circle, its ridge obtuse, its sides convex, 

 its edges sharp, with a slight festoon, and a distinct angular 

 process, its tip sharp-edged, rather flattened, acute ; the lower 

 mandible with the angle short and wide, the dorsal line con- 

 vex, the sides rounded, the edges inflected, with a semicircular 

 notch on each side close to the directly truncate tip. 



Internally the upper mandible has a strong central ridge ; 

 the lower, which is deeply concave, an elevated line. The two 

 longitudinal palatal ridges are minutely papillate ; the poste- 

 rior aperture of the nares oblong behind, linear before. The 

 tongue is short, fleshy, sagittate and papillate at the base, ob- 

 long, channelled above, horny vrith a median groove beneath, 

 rounded and emarginate at the end. The oesophagus is four 

 inches and a quarter in length, wide, dilated on the lower part 

 of the neck into a crop an inch and a half in width, then con- 

 tracted to ten-twelfths, but at the lower part enlarged. The 

 walls are thin, the mucous coat disposed in longitudinal plaits, 

 which are larger and more numerous in the crop, but dis- 

 appear, as in the other birds of prey, when the organ is filled. 

 The proventricular glands form a belt three quarters of an inch 

 in length, wdiich has six shallow longitudinal grooves. The 

 stomach is roundish, somewhat compressed, an inch and a 

 quarter in diameter when distended ; its walls thin, the mus- 

 cular coat being formed of a single series of fasciculi ; the ten- 

 dinous spaces five-twelfths in diameter. The pylorus has three 

 small knobs or valvular prominences. The intestine measures 

 thirty-one inches in length, and varies from three-twelfths to 

 a twelfth and a half in width, until the rectum, which is wider, 

 gradually dilates, and forms a globular cloaca, three-fourths of 

 an inch in width. The coeca are extremely small, forming a 

 shallow sac, not more than half a twelfth in depth. 



The eyes are large, the eyelids furnished with short ciliary 

 bristles, the superciliary ridge bare and prominent. The nos- 



