6(5 Messrs, A. and E. Newton's Observations 



the original Strix nudipes* of Daudin (Tr. d'Orn. ii, 199), yet 

 it must be confessed that the descriptions given of it by Shaw 

 (Gen. Zool. vii. 269) and Latham (Gen. Hist. B. i. 372, which 

 is a vain repetition of Shaw's) are very inaccurate. As, too, 

 Vieillot's plate of this bird (Ois. d'Am. Sept. pi. 16), which is 

 the only one published, does not well represent this species, we 

 are glad to be able to give here, by jNIr. J. H. Gurney's libe- 

 rality, a better figure of it from Mr. Wolf's pencil. The length 

 is more nearly eight than " seven inches," as mentioned by 

 Shawj and it requires a lively imagination to convert the long 

 mesial streak on each feather of the under parts into a " lyre- 

 shaped spot." Most decidedly, too, the young birds are less 

 " rufous " than the adults ; and the belly, instead of being 

 " whiter than in the full-grown bird," is of nearly the same 

 colour as the back. Dr. Cabanis states {loc. cit.) that Dr. Gund- 

 lach has met with it in Cuba ; and the Paris Museum contains 

 specimens sent from Porto Rico by M. Mauge. There is a 

 single bird in the University Museum at Edinburgh. Besides 

 this and our own four examples, now deposited in the fine col- 

 lection of Raptores at Norwich, w^e know of no others in this 

 country. 



In this species the irides are bright hazel, the bill horn-colour, 

 palest at the tip, the legs and toes pale brown, the claws horn- 

 colour. The female bird seems to be more rufous than the 

 male, with the breast and belly not so thickly mottled ; but as 

 we have only two specimens which appear to be fully adult to 

 judge from, these distinctions may be the result of age rather 

 than of sex. 



5. Barn Swallow. Hirundo horreonim, Barton (Baird's 

 Rep. B. Pac. R. R. Survey, p. 308). H. americana, Wils. 



" I observed two individuals of this species for the first time, 

 Sept. 13th, 1858, and I continued to see some almost daily up 

 to my departure from the island on the 28th of that month. 

 They were generally hawking after the manner of our own 



* There is, we think, no doubt on this point, Daudin's name being 

 founded on specimens procured by M. Mauge in Porto Rico, ^vhich are 

 now in the Paris Museum, where we have had an opportunity of examining 

 them. — Ed. 



