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



size occur iu this species, they do not seem to be of a very 

 marked character ; the length of the black patch on the wing- 

 coverts also varies in different specimens, and more consider- 

 ably so than the general dimensions. 



I subjoin a summary of some measurements of this species, 

 taken by myself, to which it may be well to premise that in 

 the genus Elanus there seems to be but very little difference 

 in the size of the sexes. Thus, in treating of E. caruleus in 

 his recent work on the birds of Ceylon, Captain Legge gives 

 the wing-measurement in males as from 10"4 to 10'8 inches, 

 and in females from 10-6 to 10-9 ; and the Norwich Museum 

 possesses a male from Transvaal, and a female from Natal, 

 in which the measurements of the wing and also of the tarsus 

 are identical; whilst a still more remarkable instance is re- 

 corded in ' Stray Feathers," vol. vii. p. 252, of a pair of these 

 Elani, obtained at Furredpore in Eastern Bengal, in which 

 the total length and wing-measurement in the male actually 

 exceeded the corresponding dimensions in the female bird. 



The under-mentioned specimens of E. cceruleus, which I 

 have measured, are preserved in the British and Norwich 

 Museums, and in the collections of Mr. Dresser and of my 

 son, Mr. J. H. Gnrney, Jun. ; the measurements are given in 

 inches and decimals^. 



Wing. 



Seville (sex unknown) 10-5 



Tangiers (two females) ...... 10"4 & 10'6 



River Gambia (sex unknown) . . 10'6 



Accra (sex imknown) 10*6 



Quanza, Portuguese possessions 



in W. Africa (sex unknown) ll'O 



Cape of Good Hope (male) .... 10-9 



Natal (two females) 10-65 & 10-6 



Transvaal (male) lO'G 



„ (three, sex miknown) 10'55-]0'9 



Zambesi (sex unknown) 10' 1 



* In this measurement I have only taken the length of the actual 

 black patch, exclusive of the blackish-brown feathers, which often adjoin 

 its posterior extremity. 



