Mr. J, H. Gurney on Birds from Natal. 25 



thologic ' for 1860, p. 242, in terms which maybe translated as 

 follows : — 



" Size of Falco aurantius. — Above brown-gi-ey, feathers with 

 black shaft-stripes; greater wing-coverts with white points on 

 each web; wing- and tail-feathers banded across with white 

 spots, the two middle rectrices unspotted. Below yellowish 

 white, with blackish-grey shaft-stripes from the chin to the belly ; 

 below the under mandible a rather broad beard-stripe. Bill 

 grey ; under mandible yellow ; legs yellowish grey ; tarsus 

 rather long, toes shorter. 



" Hah. Biga de la Paz ; Pampa.^' 



It would perhaps have been hardly possible to have identified 

 Prof. Burmeister's Falco punctipennis with Dr. Kaup's bird solely 

 from this description ; but I may state that, when at Halle in 

 October 1861, I had the pleasure of examining this and other 

 rare types collected by Prof. Burmeister at his different stations 

 in La Plata. I immediately recognized the species, and although 

 I had no opportunity of making a very accurate examination of 

 it, I am pretty confident that I am not mistaken as to its iden- 

 tity with Dr. Kaup's Spiziapteryx circumcinctus. 



Whether the bird is really referable to the genus Harpagus is, 

 I think, a matter of much doubt, and, until more is known of it^ 

 and we have become acquainted with its change of plumage and 

 other characteristics, it will be safer to use for it the generic ap- 

 pellation Spiziapteryx, or leave it under the more general desig- 

 nation of Falco circumcinctus. 



VII. — An additional List of Birds received from Natal. 

 By John Henry Gurney, M.P., F.Z.S. 



(Plate III.) 



Having had the pleasure of receiving from Mr. Thomas Ayres, 

 of Natal, some additional species of birds collected by him in 

 that colony, I beg to communicate a list of them for insertion 

 in the ' Ibis,' together with the accompanying observations which 

 Mr. Ayres has been so good as to send me, and to which I have 

 appended a few notes of my own. 



