ee BIRDS OF SOMERSETSHIRE. 
Family FALCONID. 
WHITETAILED Kiacie, Halieétus albicilla. Of the 
Falconide we may include as many as thirteen out 
of the twenty recognized British species in the list 
of Somersetshire birds. The present species, the 
Whitetailed Eagle, I include on the authority of 
Yarrell, who says that ‘ Specimens have been killed 
in Hampshire, Devonshire, Somersetshire and 
Shropshire,” and in several other. counties in 
England, and of Montagu, who gives a description 
of one that was killed on the Mendip Hills: he says 
it was a very small bird, probably a male, and “ that 
its talons were blunt, as if worn in confinement;” 
so this bird after all may only be an escape. But 
since that time another specimen has been killed at 
Stolford, a place near the sea between Burnham and 
(uantock’s Head, also famous for the only Somer- 
setshire specimen of the Crane. I have not seen 
this specimen, but I have been informed by several 
people who have that it is a very fine mature bird. 
This bird does not'‘appear to be very particular in 
the matter of food, taking either fish, fowl* or flesh: 
amongst sheep and lambst it commits a good deal of 
damage. Yarrell seems to think it is particularly 
partial to venison, and especially fawns, being occa- 
Seen feeding on a Gull (Zool. for 1864, p. 8875.) 
+ Zool. for 1864, p. 9126. 
