72 Mr. J. H. Gurney's Notes on 



(to which Mr. S ha rpe applies the specific name of A;orscAw?i*), 

 and M. affinis, are very closely allied ; and in their nestling- 

 plumage t they are so much alike that specimens in this 

 stage, of which the locality is unknown, cannot, in my 

 opinion, be distinguished with certainty, though a clue to a 

 correct diagnosis exists in the circumstance that Australian 

 and Oceanic specimens of M. affinis are a little smaller than 

 either M. migrans or M. (segyptius, and also that in M. affinis 

 and in most specimens of M. (sgyptius the upper mandible 

 is of a slightly more elongated shape, with the culmen a little 

 less proportionally elevated than in M. migrans. 



In nestling birds the bill is black in all three species ; but 

 in old birds it is so in M. migrans % and in M. affinis only, 

 being of a yellow horn-colour in the adult M. cegyptius. 



In adult birds the abdominal and tibial feathers are more 

 rufous in M. migrans and in AI. cegyptius than in M. affinis ; 

 but this rufous tint is sometimes lighter and brighter in M. 

 cegyptius than in M. migrans. 



In old birds of M. migrans the edges of the feathers of the 

 entire head, neck, and upper breast are greyish white, the 

 centre being occupied by a dark brown shaft-mark ; in M. 

 cegyptius and M. affinis this greyish-white ground-colour is 

 usually limited to the chin and to that part of the sides of 

 the neck which immediately adjoins the upper throat, though 

 very old specimens of both sometimes occur in which the 



* I agree witli the view expressed by the Editor in ' The Ibis ' for 1874, 

 p. 360, and confirmed by Mr. Dresser in his article on this species in the 

 ' Birds of Europe,' also by Mr. Blanford in his 'Eastern Persia,' vol. ii. 

 p. 114, note, that the old specific name of korschun affixed by Mr. Sharpe 

 to this Kite has been so applied on insufficient grounds, and should there- 

 fore be allowed to remain obsolete and in abeyance (conf. Ibis, 1875, 

 p. 503), 



t Mr. Hume, at p. 324 of his 'Scrap-book,' quotes a letter of mine 

 which was written at a time when I was not acquainted with the true 

 nestling-plumage of the Australian 3f. affinis, and which, in consequence, 

 alludes to it in incorrect terms. This error on my part also appeared in 

 ' Stray Feathers ' for 1873, p. 161, note, as it had previously in ' The Ibis ' 

 for 1866, p. 422. 



X The bill, however, is occasionally, though rarely, a little mottled with 

 horn-colour in some specimens of M. mir/rans. 



