THE OSPKEY. 



25 



to be as well entitled to specific rank as some 

 universally admitted specie-, of the genu*. 



Apparently the only other letters in Swain- 

 son's correspondence relative to Audubon are 

 two: cine is from J. C. Loudon from Bayswater, 

 dated "8 April 1828," and probably is about the 

 review which Swainson afterwards wrote; the 

 other is from Peter Mark Roget, the Secretary of 

 the Royal Society, dated "9 March 1830," and 

 conveys the information that Audubon was "to 



be balloted for at the Royal Society." Audu- 

 bon was duly elected and. in a letter to Swainson 

 of "5 May 1830," showed that he was "greatly 

 elated by his election." The requisites for 

 membership then were not what they are now! 

 The Royal Society, by the way, was pronounced 

 about that time, by its secretary, to have its 

 "affairs" in a ■■critical state"' — whatever that 

 may mean. Such are the words used in 

 Giinther's brief of a letter of "5 Dec. 1830." 



THE OSPREY OR PISHHAWK; ITS CHARACTERISTICS AND HABITS. 



By Theodore Gii.i,, Washing-ton. D. C. 



c 'ontinued jrom Page I 'ol. I '. />. i>. 



OSPREY S FOOT 



The classical name Pandion was given by 

 Savigny in 1809, ami. like many of the classical 

 names imposed upon genera by naturalists, was 

 bestowed for no obvious or real reason simply 

 as a designation t<> distinguish the group from 

 others. Now. there were five personages of that 

 name mentioned by ancient writers and it is nut 

 evident, from the nature of the facts, after which 

 one Savigny designated the genus in question. 

 Savigny gave no explanation whatever. All 

 that need be said i- that one of them was fabled 

 to have been a son of EJrichthonius, king of 

 Athens, by the Naiad Pasithea, and that In 1" 

 came the father of Procne and Philomela, the 

 former of whom was metamorphosed into a 

 -wallow and the latter into a nightingale. Both 

 of the last names have been applied with some 

 show of aptness to genera of birds — one of 

 swallows and the other to the nightingale genus 

 — but there is no apparent analogy or aptitude 

 of any kind forthe application of Pandion to the 

 Fishhawk or any other raptorial genus of birds, 

 although it might not have been entirely devoid 

 of applicability forthe Nightingale. (See Ovid's 

 Epistuhe ex Ponto, 1, 36.) Nevertheless the 

 name stands just as Black will do for a white 

 man or White for a black man. 



Leach's name — Trioleins — was given appar- 

 ently in ignorance of Savigny's work, and was 



published only in connection wiih the species 

 [Triorches fluvialis) a- a British bird in the 

 British Museum. The name is only identifiable 

 because it i- mentioned as the scientific alterna- 

 tive of the English word < Isprey. 



Fleming's name "BaTvBusardus, | Pandion of 

 Savigny)" was apparently given on the as- 

 sumption that the name under which Willughby 

 noticed the bird should he recognized as a 

 generic designation an entirely illegitimate 

 assumption as the old English author described 

 it as a species on the authority of Aldrovandi. 

 The name Balbusardus i- -imply the latiniza- 

 tion of the English Balbuzard in a work 

 written in Latin. In the English edition Bal- 

 buzard is the word used. 



The generally accepted English literary equiv- 

 alent of Pandion i- Osprey. This name has a 

 long history. Among the educated English of 

 the British islands, it appears to have almost 

 entirely replaced all other name-, of the Pandion 

 and yet it is not a true vernacular name. It is 

 a corruption of the word ossifraga or bone- 

 breaker (from os, bone, frangere, to break) used 

 at least as long ago as Pliny's time and which 

 was originally coined for a very different bird — 

 the Lammergeyer or Bearded Vulture of South- 

 ern Europe and isothermal Asia. This Lam- 

 mergeyer was reputed to be very fond of bones 



