126 SWALLOW-TAILED KITE. 



The brood devouring Kite. 



QUARLES. 



It is apt to visit the poultry yard, but is actually known to 

 have been driven off by a spirited old hen. 



And other losses do the dames recite, 

 Of Chick, and Duck, and Gosling gone astray, 

 All falling preys to the fell swooping Kite ; 

 And on the story runs, morning, noon and night. 



Clare— Village Minstrel. 



Kites are ever on the look out for carrion. 



The Kite will to her carrion fly. 



King — Ai^t of Love. 



Shakespeare says — 



Ravens, Crows, and Kites 

 Fly o'er our heads, and downward look on us 

 As we were sickly prey. 



—Julius Ccesar, V. 2. 



To show the force of circumstantial evidence he says — 



Who finds the Partridge in the Pattock's nest. 

 But may imagine how the bird was dead. 

 Although the Kite soar with unbloodied beak. 



—2nd Henry VL, III. t 



Bacon gives us a rural proverb, that 



Kites flying aloft show fair and dry weather. 



[MiLYUS MIGRANS — Black Kite.] 

 Once recorded in Great Britain, 1867. 



Genus— ELANOIDES. 



ELANOIDES FURCATUS— Swallow-tailed Kite. 



\Nauclerus furcatns — Yarrell?\ 



The Rev. Clement Ley says with reference to this bird : — 

 "There is no satisfactory evidence of its having been met with in 

 Herefordshire. Once, in i860 or 1S61, I saw a Kite deep black 



