OS PREY 66 1 



the Falconidm not only pterylologically, as long ago observed by 

 Nitzsch, but also osteologically," as pointed out by M. Alphonse 

 Milne-Edwards {Ois. Foss. France, ii. pp. 413, 419), and it is a curious 

 fact that in some of the characters in which it differs structurally 

 from the Falconidx, it agrees with certain of the Owls, especially in 

 possessing a bony bridge or loop {a, in fig.) on the upper part of the 

 anterior face of the tarsometatarse, through which passes the 

 common extensor tendon of the toes ; ^ and in having the exterior 

 toe partly reversible ; but the most important parts of its internal 

 structure, as well as of its ptilosis, quite forbid a belief that there 

 is any near alliance of the two groups. 



The Osprey is one of the most cosmopolitan Birds -of -Prey. 

 From Alaska to Brazil, from Lapland to Natal, from Japan to 

 Tasmania, and in some of the islands of the Pacific, it occurs as a 

 winter-visitant or as a native. The countries which it does not 

 frequent would be more easily named than those in which it is 

 found — and among the former are Ireland, Iceland and New 

 Zealand. Though migratory in Europe at least, it is generally 

 independent of climate. It breeds equally on the half -thawed 

 shores of Hudson's Bay and on the cays of Honduras, in the dense 

 forests of Finland and on the barren rocks of the Red Sea, in 

 Kamchatka and in West Australia. Where, through abundance of 

 food, it is numerous — as in former days was the case in the eastern 

 part of the United States — the nests of the Fish-Hawk (to use its 

 American name) may be placed on trees to the number of three 

 hundred close together. Where food is scarcer and the species 

 accordingly less plentiful, a single pair will occupy an isolated rock, 

 and jealously expel all intruders of their kind, as happens in 

 Scotland.^ The lover of birds cannot see many more enjoyable 

 spectacles than an Osprey engaged in fishing — poising itself aloft, 

 with upright body, and wings beating horizontally, ere it plunges 

 like a plummet beneath the water, and immediately after reappears 

 shaking a shower of drops from its plumage. The feat of carrying 

 off an Osprey 's eggs is often difficult, and attended with some risk, 

 but has more than once tempted the most daring of birds' nesters. 

 Apart from the dangerous situation not unfrequently chosen by the 

 birds for their eyry, — a steep rock in a lonely lake, only to be 

 reached after a long swim through chilly water, or the summit of a 



characters on which he founds sucli an important division are obviouslj' inade- 

 quate. The other genus associated with Pmidion by him has been shewn by Mr. 

 Gurney {Ihis, 1878, p. 455) to be nearly allied to the ordinary Sea-EAGLES 

 {Haliaetus), and therefore one of the true Fahonidse. 



^ This character is possessed by the group of Owls of the subfamily Striginse, 

 according to the nomenclature of this work, but not by those of the Aliicinse. 



^ Two good examples of the different localities chosen by this bird for its nest 

 are illustrated in Ootheca Wolleyana, pis. B. & H. 



