24. ACCIPITER. 149 



Adult male. Above deep slate-colour, the scapulars with concealed 

 white spots, and the nape also mottled with white ; quills ashy 

 brown, barred with darker brown, plainer underneath, where the 

 interspaces are white or ashy white, the secondaries shaded with 

 slate-colour above and tipped witli liglit ashy ; tail ashy brown, 

 tipped with white and crossed with four bands of dark brown ; sides 

 of face tawny rufous, excepting a shade of slaty grey on the upper 

 margin of the ear-coverts ; throat white ; rest of under surface 

 imiform tawny rufous, under tail-coverts white ; under wing- 

 coverts tawny buff, the axiUaries slightly tipped with whitish ; cere 

 and orbits yellow ; bill black, bluish at base ; feet yeUow ; iris fiery 

 yellow. Total length 12-5 inches, culmen 0-9, wing 8-2, tail 6-3, 

 tarsus 2-05. 



Adult female. A little larger than the male, but similar in colour. 

 Total length 14 inches, wing 9-4, tarsus 2-25. 



Jdab. Southern and North-eastern Africa. 



Sir A. Smith [C.l. 

 M. J. Verreaux [C.l. 

 M. J. Verreaux [Cl. 

 Sir W. C. Harris [C.]. 

 Sir W. C. Hams |C.1. 



16. Accipiter ventralis. 



Accipiter erythrocnemius ?, Scl. P. Z. S. 1855, p. 1.34. 



Accipiter ventralis, <S'e/. P. Z. S. 1866, p. 303 ; Scl. 4'- Salv. Rv. Om. 



p. L>5, pi. xiii. (1867); Grai/, Iland-l. £. i. p. 32 (1869;; Scl. ^ 



Salv. Nomencl. Av. Neotr. p.*120 (1873). 

 Accipiter nigriplumbeus, Lawr. Ann. Lye. N. Y. 1869, p. 270. 



Young. Above dark brown, the nape washed and all the feathers 

 of the upper surface edged with rufous ; sides of face rufous, 

 streaked with dark brown ; under surface bufty white, narrowly 

 lined on the throat with dark brown, the chest streaked with brown, 

 somewhat tinged with rufous on some of the feathers, on the lower 

 breast and abdomen widening out into bars, the under tail-coverts 

 white, narrowly lined with brown down the shaft ; thighs blight 

 chestnut ; under wing-coverts white, washed with ochre, and plenti- 

 fully spotted or barred with blackish ; quills dark brown, with bars 

 of still darker brown, almost invisible above, but plainer under- 

 neath, Avhero the interspaces arc ashy white; tail blackish brown, 

 tiiJi^ed with whitish and crossed with four bands of ashy grey ; bill 

 blackish horn-colour, yellowish at the base of the lower mandible ; 

 feet yellow, claws black ; iris yellow. 



Adult male. Deep slaty grey, including the sides of the face and 

 ear-covcrts ; the entire under surface bright chestnut, the cheeks 

 also washed with this colour, a few whitish cross bars remaining 

 on the lower abdomen ; under wing-coverts rufous, the lower ones 

 somewhat inclining to ashy white, barred across with blackish ; 

 quills black, the secondaries slaty grey like the back, the under 

 surface ashy grey, white near the base, crossed with broad blackish 

 bands ; tail black, tipped with whitish and barred across with four 



